Thursday, January 27, 2022

The cost of crying wolf

Why do so many Americans believe crazy things? Maybe not "crazy," but beliefs that wildly get wrong factual costs and benefits, such as those of vaccines? 

It does not help that they have been lied to, over and over again. Why should they believe anything now? Our elites, and in particular our public health bureaucrats, though invoking the holy name of "science," have been trying to massage public psychology via deliberate obfuscation for a few years now. There is little science of managing public psychology, and if there is, epidemiologists don't have it. There is some good ancient wisdom, as codified in the story of the boy who cried wolf.  We do know that when lies are exposed, when elites are shown to be disparaging and trying to manipulate average people, trust erodes. 

This thought is boosted by Marty Makary's WSJ Oped "The High Cost of Disparaging Natural Immunity to Covid."

For most of last year, many of us called for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to release its data on reinfection rates, but the agency refused. Finally last week, the CDC released data from New York and California, which demonstrated natural immunity was 2.8 times as effective in preventing hospitalization and 3.3 to 4.7 times as effective in preventing Covid infection compared with vaccination.

Yet the CDC spun the report to fit its narrative, bannering the conclusion “vaccination remains the safest strategy.” 

Why? Well, both facts can be true. It can be true that immunity from previous exposure is very powerful, and even more powerful than vaccination, but that vaccination rather than let-it-rip, lockdowns, or masks, remains the safest public health strategy.  Why not say so? Because the CDC thinks we're morons and can't understand that, so it must suppress evidence of natural immunity to scare people into vaccination. Then the word gets out, and people trust the CDC even less. (The rest of the article is great on facts of natural immunity.) 

It's worse.

The narrative disparaging natural immunity does not just counter the do-nothing policy, it reinforces policies for mandatory vaccination. As it becomes clear that vaccines do not stop transmission (another falsehood reiterated by many local vaccine mandates -- vaccinate to "make the workplace safe" for the rest of us), the rationale for mandatory vaccination, which mostly protects the patient, is much weaker. 

As the article makes clear, the Narrative is also in support of policies for mandatory vaccination of those who have had Covid, so have natural immunity, and not allowing proof of prior infection in place of vaccination. I guess the latter is to enforce a sort of "we're all in this together with no excuses" mentality. Heaven knows what science justifies that. 

As the article points out, once it turned out that many Americans resist vaccination, for whatever reason, this policy has been a disaster. 

By firing staff with natural immunity, employers got rid of those least likely to infect others. It’s time to reinstate those employees with an apology...

...public-health officials recklessly destroyed the careers of everyday Americans, rallying to fire pilots, truck drivers and others in the supply-chain workforce who didn’t get vaccinated. And in the early months of the vaccine rollout, when supplies were limited, we could have saved many more lives by giving priority to those who didn’t have recorded natural immunity.

CDC, FDA: Provide information, timely, truthfully, transparently, and with warnings of uncertainty. Earn trust, don't squander it trying to manipulate people. Like the wolf-boy, the trust you earn with each pronouncement is far more important than the announcement itself. 

******** 

Incentives to get vaccinated are another sad story of American policy. We seem unable to get past the old joke about communism that everything is either mandatory or forbidden. (I tried to get a booster in September and ran in to forbidden. Before it became mandatory.) 

A small section of commentary suggests that unvaccinated people not be treated in emergency rooms. Doctors and medical ethicists answer, correctly, that this is inhuman. But as a corollary to the last theorem, everything in America must now be free or denied. The right answer would seem to be, if you are not vaccinated, health insurance will adjust your premiums, as they do for smokers. Why must higher premiums for unvaccinated people be illegal? 



39 comments:

  1. Good points. I'm particularly I'm favor of vaccines and got all the required shoots. However, I don't really blame the average Joe if he doesn't want to take the vaccine because he doesn't trust the public health "experts".
    I mean, come on, besides all the points you talked about we still had: WHO being against masks, WHO saying that in cooperation with Chinese officers they found no evidence of human to human transmission (I even have print screens from their tweets), hundreds (HUNDREDS!) of epidemiologists signing a letter saying that BLM protests, in the most critical moment of the pandemic, were necessary and presented no significant risk of transmission.

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    1. Those are all valid reasons for being angry with public health officials and thinking the CDC and the WHO need radical overhauls. They are not reasons for refusing to take the vaccine. The germ theory of disease is real. The disease is likely to be transmitted through the air - in which case masks and social distancing are prudent. At this point there have been so many hundreds of millions of vaccine doses given that the safety and efficacy should be readily apparent whether or not you would trust the CDC or the WHO to tell you the time of day.

      It makes no sense to say "the CDC lied to me at the start when they downplayed the seriousness so they must be lying and exaggerating the seriousness now."

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    2. COVID vaccines: The COVID vaccines have killed tens of thousands of people and injured hundreds of thousands of people (https://openvaers.com/covid-data). More people have died from the COVID vaccines than from all of the other vaccines combined since 1997. And the vaccinated are not protected from getting or spreading COVID or from getting seriously ill and dying from COVID (see Belgium, Israel, UK, Iceland, Ireland, Singapore, Gibralter, etc., all highly vaccinated countries), so what is he point of the vaccines especially if they weaken our immune systems and make us more likely to have complications and die from COVID?

      https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/new-big-data-study-of-145-countries - New big data study of 145 countries show COVID vaccines makes things worse (cases and deaths). The study found that the COVID vaccines cause more COVID cases per million (+38% in US) and more deaths per million associated with COVID (+31% in US).

      https://popularrationalism.substack.com/p/in-the-united-states-vaccination - James Lyons-Weiler recently showed that the US state data shows that the more we vaccinate, the higher the # of COVID cases.

      https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/19843315.covid-scotland-case-rates-lowest-unvaccinated-double-jabbed-elderly-drive-rise-hospital-admissions/ - COVID Scotland: Case rates lowest in unvaccinated as double-jabbed elderly drive rise in hospital admissions.

      According to Dr. Robert Malone: A statement out of Israel reports a nosocomial outbreak involving 16 healthcare workers, 23 exposed patients and two family members. The source was a fully vaccinated COVID-19 patient. The vaccination rate was 96.2% among all 248 exposed individuals (151 healthcare workers and 97 patients). Out of the 248 people, fourteen fully vaccinated patients became severely ill or died, and two unvaccinated patients developed mild disease

      Masks: The COVID-19 virus is tiny and most masks are ineffective at stopping the virus because the diameter of coronavirus — is 0.13 microns (a micron is 1,000 times smaller than a millimeter). The best N95 standard mask only filters down to 0.3 microns, therefore the masks are ineffective in stopping transmission of COVID. Wearing a mask is like putting up a chain link fence to stop mosquitos.

      I think most people know that masks are useless for stopping COVID and masks are harmful for socializing, learning, breathing, peer interaction, and masks are devastating for autistic and deaf children. Masks can also cause bacterial and fungal infections, etc. Even the CDC and former FDA director Scott Gottlieb said masks do not stop coronaviruses.

      And, according to a study by Rhode Island Hospital and Brown University (https://www.bmj.com/content/374/bmj.n2031), young children showed a 22-point drop in IQ (IQ dropped from 100 to 78 - therefore children went from average intelligence (100 IQ) to retarded (78 IQ). The 22-point drop in IQ in young children is because the masks, lockdowns, and social distancing, etc., cause a lack of stimulation from peers, parents, grandparents, etc.

      Solution: There are over 213 million people in Nigeria but less than 3,200 COVID deaths. Could the Nigerians have a low death rate (.0001) from COVID because they take hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) daily to prevent malaria? Could therapeutics/medications (combination of ivermectin, Fluvoxamine, and Methylprednisolone along with HCQ/Quercetin, zinc, vitamin D3 and C, as well as monoclonal antibodies) be the answer to treating/curing COVID?

      No one needs to die from COVID if we use medications and therapeutics like the ones listed above for prevention and early treatment, and if we encourage people to keep their weight in check, exercise, and eat and sleep well.

      Delete
  2. I am unhappy with the quality of most public health guidance and believe they should have been better. On the other hand there seem to be legions of bad faith actors perfectly happy to seize on anything they can to get their own piece of the public attention. Some of those bad faith actors are in politics and some are in the media and some are trying to establish followings on social media.

    To say that immunity acquired by having had Covid gives better protection than getting the vaccine is meaningless, or worse, if you are 1,000 times more likely to die from having Covid than from getting the vaccine.

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    1. When you have been deluded it's really hard to accept reality. Good luck with that.

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    2. COVID has a 99% survival rate for those under age 70, and not recognizing natural immunity and early treatment has let to disastrous outcomes and deaths.

      Drs Ioannidis & Axfors at Stanford - survival rate for COVID
      Age Infection Survival Rate
      0-19 99.9973%
      20-29 99.986%
      30-39 99.969%
      40-49 99.918%
      50-59 99.73%
      60-69 99.41%
      70+ 97.6% (non-inst.)
      70+ 94.5% (all)

      https://brownstone.org/articles/natural-immunity-and-covid-19-twenty-nine-scientific-studies-to-share-with-employers-health-officials-and-politicians/ - 30 peer reviewed scientific studies showing the protection and longevity of natural immunity

      If, per Fauci, everyone will get omicron/COVID, regardless of vaccination status, masks, social distancing, etc., then we can abolish all COVID restrictions and stop the vaccine mandates?

      89% of Covid-19 deaths in the UK are among the fully vaccinated, which proves this is a ‘pandemic of the fully vaccinated’ and suggests the vaccinated are more likely to die. The fully vaxed are the ones filling up hospitals in the US and in other countries.

      The COVID vaccines do not prevent the vaccinated from getting and/or spreading COVID or from getting seriously ill and/or dying from COVID? Why mandate ineffective vaccines when there are highly effective therapeutics/medications (Ivermectin, nitazoxanide, proxalutamide, Fluvoxamine, azithromycin, Methylprednisolone, spironolactone, dutasteride, vitamin D3, vitamin C, Quercetin/HCQ, and zinc) as well as Regeneron’s monoclonal antibody therapy to treat COVID and prevent serious illness, hospitalization, and/or death.

      Delete
  3. "Because the CDC thinks we're morons and can't understand that, so it must suppress evidence of natural immunity to scare people into vaccination."

    The CDC can protect itself by pointing to numbers of vaccinations. Natural immunity does nothing for the CDC. It's all quite rational.

    What bothers me personally is only their brazenness.

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  4. Excellent blogging.

    The war on Covid-19 has become the public health sector's Vietnamistan.

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  5. The issue aren't false beliefs like anti vax that go against 'expert' or 'elite' opinion. The FAR more worrisome issue are the patently false beliefs of the elite and 'experts' themselves, on issues such as sexual identity, race, criminology, psychometrics, etc. These drive actual policy impacting almost every aspect of governance from education, immigration, welfare, taxation, police enforcement, sentencing, etc. And they repeatedly get it wrong and double down on insanity.

    I'll gladly take some populistic dumb takes over that.

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    1. There is a good point here. Every lie undermines every truth. When public health authorities ration vaccines to "redress historic inequities," as they did in California, then people use that information when deciding whether their current advice has scientific merit. And people don't necessarily appreciate the fine lines between bureaucracies as we do. Every bit of fantastical spin by Washington politicians and bureaucrats undermines trust in the occasional quite reasonable pronouncement by other Washington politicians or bureaucrats. After the boy cried wolf too many times, they also ignore the girl who cries wolf when the real wolf appears.

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    2. I agree. Whether they like it or not, all "experts" are part of a meta-guild of "experts". Their credibility is held jointly. If they had a code of ethics, one of the rules would be "Nothing false". Anyone in any field who undermines trust does so across the board. It's not fair or logical; it's the way people respond.

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  6. "As it becomes clear that vaccines do not stop transmission" Could you please qualify this statement to make clear that vaccines do not *fully* stop transmission, but they reduce transmission, both through preventing many infections altogether and by reducing viral load among those who do get infected despite vaccination.

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    1. Oh like the US Naval vessel that was quarantined last week? Everyone on board was fully vaccinated but 236 plus crew members came down with the Wuhan.

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  8. "I tried to get a booster in September and ran in to forbidden. Before it became mandatory."

    I could tell the same story, except that my brother is an experienced pulmonary physician. He coached me on the magic words to use to get around the bureaucratic barrier.

    Not to put too fine a point on it, but, I lied and got my booster. I don't feel bad about it.

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  9. In the referenced study cited at the WSJ, do the authors control for hospitalization of previously infected people? Ex-ante, I am not surprised that previously infected people have lower chances of being hospitalized because they have proved to have good immunity to survive the first time they were exposed to the virus. Also, even if they control for previously hospitalizations, my assumption is that these people would be more careful after coming out of the hospital, so even if they get re-infected perhaps the viral load is low because they have been more careful. Am I missing something?

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  10. I agree that vaccination remains the safest public health strategy. We are ok there. We may also agree that, current lies or not, vaccination remains the most important or a key part of the strategy, so I am ok to accept the noise (lies, mishaps, miscommunication, etc). While data on reinfection rates and more transparency (now, in the past and future) should be expected, the focus on vaccination may be more effective than a plethora of measures that may muddy the waters, especially for the average folk "doing their research". So, while the overall approach of government agencies should feature more transparency regarding data, the public policy strategy should focus on the most effective tools, or tool in this case. "Get vaccinated and wear a mask when indoors" is not much of an ask frankly, and it is a clear line. Whether "the CDC" thinks we're morons is a bit besides the point frankly. Most of us have cognitive/information processing limitations (kids' homework, bills to pay, other health issues, etc) and a simple line that is adjusted in line with the preponderance of evidence is called for; do the vaccines remain the best tool? Yes. Any reason not to wear better masks indoor? No. Recalibrate type of mask in public communication. Boosters needed? Add that "Get vaxxed, get boosted". Rinse and repeat. Mistakes will be made. Has the focus on vaccines waned? No. Good then. Again, regardless of whether "the CDC" thinks we are morons. We should continue to review the experience, including in 2020 to learn and incorporate lessons going forward. Same with natural immunity. But only add to broader public policy strategy if there is a clear message with positive payoffs. The fact that 15 thousand people are expected to die over the next week when vaccines are widely available, indicates that there are morons out there. I wager that they are not "doing their own research" on the cost and benefits of natural immunity - instead they watch a certain set of TV channels and worship a few personalities (there are data on that, don't take my word for it). And nothing wrong with that, this is
    a free country. I hope the unvaccinated stay safe, don't get sick, and wish they would join smokers in my health insurance plans. But none of the above change the fact that public policy is largely appropriate as it continues to focus on the the best available tool to reduce hosp/mortality: vaccines. If there is confusion about masks and boosters, no need to add new guidance or recommendations focused on natural immunity. More, not less, of a KISS approach is needed here. Parsimony and common sense should not be underrated. Cheers.

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    1. Our hospitals would not have to treat anyone with COVID, whether vaxxed or not, if the medical community would emphasize early treatment with therapeutics/medications (Ivermectin, nitazoxanide, proxalutamide, Fluvoxamine, azithromycin, Methylprednisolone, spironolactone, dutasteride, vitamin D3, vitamin C, Quercetin/HCQ, and zinc) as well as Regeneron’s monoclonal antibody therapy to treat COVID and prevent serious illness, hospitalization, and/or death.

      Why have we lost our collective minds and constitutional rights over a virus that has a 99% plus survival rate for those under age 70? Why would anyone require proof of vaccination when the vaccines do not prevent the vaccinated from getting and/or spreading COVID or from getting seriously ill and/or dying from COVID?

      https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/new-big-data-study-of-145-countries - New big data study of 145 countries show COVID vaccines makes things worse (cases and deaths). The study found that the COVID vaccines cause more COVID cases per million (+38% in US) and more deaths per million associated with COVID (+31% in US).

      https://twitter.com/BLNewsMedia/status/1434622637653823494 - fully vaccinated Oscar De La Hoya's comeback fight was delayed by a COVID hospitalization, meanwhile podcaster Joe Rogan, maligned for being unvaccinated, recovers in 3 days with treatments, like Ivermectin, vitamin D3, C, zinc, and monoclonal antibodies.

      Why mandate ineffective vaccines when there are highly effective therapeutics/medications (Ivermectin, nitazoxanide, proxalutamide, Fluvoxamine, azithromycin, Methylprednisolone, spironolactone, dutasteride, vitamin D3, vitamin C, Quercetin/HCQ, and zinc) as well as Regeneron’s monoclonal antibody therapy to treat COVID and prevent serious illness, hospitalization, and/or death.

      Delete
  11. The fundamental flaw in policy is that you should lie to get people to behave in the right way.

    When Fauci tells kids he vaccinated Santa, this is no exception to how many leaders at the CDC and NIH operate: Lie to get the behavior you want.

    This approach is only warranted when: 1. You actually know what's best 2. The population could never comprehend the truth.

    Neither is true here.

    This highlights why there needs to be a division between topic-expertise can policy formation. The best doctors will fail to formulate optimal policy when they don't get economics or statistics, or have incentive to balance the various needs of the population.

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  12. I agree that the CDC should be more open with its data and that many public experts have done a terrible job. However, I doubt this is responsible for much of the vaccine hesitancy we are seeing. The posts I see my family post on facebook about the vaccine are about autism or the naive belief that because vaccines don't prevent infection they don't work at all. These people wouldn't take the vaccine even if the CDC had been more transparent.

    I'd also argue that refusing to treat the unvaccinated is inhumane if there aren't enough resources to go around. If there's one hospital bed and two people -- one who reduced the risk of Covid and the other who chose not to -- the former should be the one to get it in my view. I'd agree that unvax premiums should be legal though :)

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    1. It is the vaxxed who are ending up in the hospitals sick and dying from COVID

      https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/new-big-data-study-of-145-countries - New big data study of 145 countries show COVID vaccines makes things worse (cases and deaths). The study found that the COVID vaccines cause more COVID cases per million (+38% in US) and more deaths per million associated with COVID (+31% in US).

      There are over 213 million people in Nigeria but less than 3,200 COVID deaths. Could the Nigerians have a low death rate (.0001) from COVID because they take hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) daily to prevent malaria? Could therapeutics/medications (combination of ivermectin, Fluvoxamine, and Methylprednisolone along with HCQ/Quercetin, zinc, vitamin D3 and C, as well as monoclonal antibodies) be the answer to treating/curing COVID?

      No one needs to die from COVID if we use medications and therapeutics like the ones listed above for prevention and early treatment, and if we encourage people to keep their weight in check, exercise, eat and sleep well.

      Why have we lost our collective minds and constitutional rights over a virus that has a 99% plus survival rate for those under age 70? Why would anyone require proof of vaccination when the vaccines do not prevent the vaccinated from getting and/or spreading COVID or from getting seriously ill and/or dying from COVID? Why mandate ineffective vaccines when there are highly effective therapeutics/medications (Ivermectin, nitazoxanide, proxalutamide, Fluvoxamine, azithromycin, Methylprednisolone, spironolactone, dutasteride, vitamin D3, vitamin C, Quercetin/HCQ, and zinc) as well as Regeneron’s monoclonal antibody therapy to treat COVID and prevent serious illness, hospitalization, and/or death.

      Delete
  13. Another egregious example is the Proximal Origins paper in Nature Communications in which several prominent virologists argued that “we do not believe that any type of laboratory based scenario is plausible,” even though FOIAed emails reveal that several of them had privately expressed the view that a natural original was unlikely only days before writing the paper: eg Garry said “I just can’t figure out how this [gain of function] gets accomplished in nature.” Fauci was in on those emails. The Proximal Origins paper apepars to have been written under pressure from Fauci and Collins. The 11 January letter from the Oversight Committee has details.

    We’ll start trusting the experts when they start being trustworthy. I won’t be holding my breath: apparently Fauci was on the radio just this week saying a lab leak is very unlikely. It’s really just insane behaviour — they seem to be actively doing their best to destroy trust in science.

    https://republicans-oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Letter-Re.-Feb-1-Emails-011122.pdf

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  15. It is my understanding that vaccines reduce your odds of infection and also reduce the amount of time that you are infectious. Also, they do both of these reductions better if you get 2 doses rather than 1 one. Also, better if you get 3 doses rather than 2.

    The public discourse is too often in boolean statements when probabilities statements would be more accurate. This certainly undermines the trust of the public.

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  16. Adjustment of health insurance premiums is the sensible response in the US, but obviously isn't possible in countries with a public health system, i.e., most of them. In principle, the same thing could be achieved via a surcharge or tax, but this would be administratively cumbersome and of doubtful effectiveness. In such circumstances, some kind of quantity rationing in health may be the only feasible response. Far from 'inhuman', that would seem to be a far kinder, and more directly consequential, policy than depriving people of their careers, social circles, and ability to access all kinds of services.

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  17. Inflation!

    Why isn't anyone listening?

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  18. Why do so many Americans believe crazy things? Maybe not "crazy," but beliefs that wildly get wrong factual costs and benefits, such as those of vaccines?

    It does not help that they have been lied to, over and over again. Why should they believe anything now? Our elites, and in particular our public health bureaucrats, though invoking the holy name of "science," have been trying to massage public psychology via deliberate obfuscation for a few years now. There is little science of managing public psychology, and if there is, epidemiologists don't have it. There is some good ancient wisdom, as codified in the story of the boy who cried wolf. We do know that when lies are exposed, when elites are shown to be disparaging and trying to manipulate average people, trust erodes.


    Anxieties regarding the "management" of the public has been around a good long time. Plato's The Republic is a lamentation about the end of idealism. His position that the philosophers (the elite) should run the city-state was rooted in a severe mistrust of the public. Machiavelli "modernized" his position and it became about how to manipulate the public as so to prevent instability/chaos.

    Point is, there has been a long history of distrust of the public, for it's the belief that they cannot manage their affairs properly, and thus, it needs to be chosen for them. Remember that "The Prince" was rewritten by Hobbes in "The Leviathan," and Locke would later rewrite it for his cultural epoch during the Rationalist Enlightenment, which heavily influenced the Founding Fathers. Even Jefferson had a severe mistrust of the public.

    This is nothing new, but it wrestles with the problem that in the end, people just don't like being told what to do. Freedom only exists in a confined, pre-determined structure. Michel Foucault's "Madness and Civilization" isn't really about mental health: it's about how society has a built in immune system to remove and isolate those that do not fit into recognizable society or refuse to adhere to "established norms."

    I suppose this goes to the idea of "useful myths." The problem arises when the veil is pierced and there's a swamp of contradictory data and opinions lurking beneath.

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  19. I am fully-vaccinated and boostered based on my personal situation and risk assessment. I consider the broad resistance to all vaccines a tragedy but it should be obvious that shame, insults and coercion build resentment and make the problem of vaccine resistance worse.

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    1. Sure, if sweet reason would work that is preferable. If appeals to the common good would work, that would be preferable. In my case, I have a couple of young adult children who were vaccine hesitant until the British Columbia government said: "if you want to go to a bar or restaurant then you need to vaccinated"; at which point they got vaccinated. But the aggressive anti-vaxxers who seize on any quibble or nuance and treat it as a complete rebuttal are not susceptible to reason so we are left with: "get vaccinated or stay away from us".

      We are at a point where soon we will start lifting more restrictions but that is just because the number of unvaccinated has declined to the point where the hospitals and morgues will be able to handle the extra cases.

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    2. Common good —- interesting. Whose common good? You NEVER sacrifice personal liberty and freedom for the collective good —- that is the mantra of communism.

      I will not take this vaccine and not because I’m an anti-vaxxer. By the designers’ own admission, it’s not a vaccine. Vaccines PREVENT acquisition of said disease. This SHOT guarantees nothing, except a less severe case of a disease with over a 99% survival rate. Also, numerous scientific reports show that 4 times as many spores were present in vaccinated people.

      Here is the foundational problem of lying and misleading humans: in order to maintain your illusion you have to censor all opposition or vilify any expert whose data contradicts your lie

      Another problem with dishonesty is that once your illusion in shown to be fiction you have two options: come clean or continue the narrative. World leaders, both medical and political, opted for the latter. Problem: the veil has been lifted.

      Too many reports, from over 149 countries including the US, show the VACCINATED ARE DYING AT A HIGHER RATE THAN THE UNVACCINATED. Healthy young men dying of Myocarditis, women delivering stillborn children or miscarrying, extremely fit professional athletes dying of cardiac arrests —/ all after vaccination. These are not isolated nor unrelated. If we are saying science is driving the vaccine, then why aren’t these side effects from a “safe” vaccine being widely reported and investigated? None of the MSM has reported on this —- their job is to continue the narrative and they have the majority of the population as their viewing audience.

      All this aside, I find your rationale both disconcerting and cruel at best, and manipulative and hateful at its worse. If you research behaviors associated with Hitler’s brown shirts, you will find you share much of the bravado that made them a lethal medicine to Nazi opponents, and ultimately to the great nation of Germany. Their goal was also the COMMON GOOD of German people. Their tactics: first, propaganda. Next, coercion. Then, intimidation. Then, violence. Then, use of fellow Germans to isolate and betray their fellow man, and finally, death to any opposition.

      Forcing compliance for Common Good, however pure your paint your motives, eventually eradicates freedom and liberty for your opposition, and ultimately—- you.

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  20. Unfortunately, the WSJ article you cite is behind a paywall, but that's OK as I stopped reading their OpEds long ago.

    I suspect the CDC research they refer to is dated 1/19/22 and be reached at: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7104e1.htm.

    Several thoughts struck me as I read the summary of findings on this study: 1) we knew nothing about Covid 19 and how to treat it when it first appeared. 2) our understanding of Covid 19, how it affects people and how to treat it, has constantly evolved since, especially as new variants have emerged, and 3) numerous mistakes by politicians and scientific communities along the way have only made things worse. Two years into the pandemic, its easy to claim that masks and lockdowns haven't made any difference, but that's a position impossible to defend as we simply don't know what the outcome would have been had we not taken these measures.

    The CDC article cited above does make clear that so-called "natural" immunity may, in fact, be stronger than that conferred through vaccination. However, and this cannot be underscored enough, natural immunity can only obtained through actually contracting the virus, which may lead to serious illness, hospitalization or death. Being vaccinated on the other hand, reduces the likelihood of being infected in the first place and if infected, can reduce the severity and mortality of being infected.

    The WSJ's article may suggest that natural immunity is better than that conveyed through vaccination, but the CDC's conclusion remains the same: "Initial infection among unvaccinated persons increases risk for serious illness, hospitalization, long-term sequelae, and death.....Thus, vaccination remains the safest and primary strategy to prevent SARS-CoV-2 infections, associated complications, and onward transmission."

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    1. "However, and this cannot be underscored enough, natural immunity can only obtained through actually contracting the virus, which may lead to serious illness, hospitalization or death."

      Oh look - its our old friend selection bias.

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    2. More specifically, survivorship bias. A reoccurring issue in the mutual fund performance literature.

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  21. Thierry are six questions I have asked since the vaccine “push” began:

    1) Vaccine development and approval is a 7-10 year project —- based on all previous vaccines. How did this vaccine go from inception to injection in under a year??

    2) THE MEDICAL COMMUNITY— SCIENCE —- has always said natural immunity is the best. Yet before they,d even isolated the COVID 19 germ or developed a VALID, ACCURATE test, these “experts” were saying a vaccine was better than natural immunity. When did our immune systems stop doing their designated job of producing antibodies to disease?

    3) I’ve never had vaccines for measles, mumps, rubella, whooping cough because many “boomers” had these diseases. only children that hadn’t had the disease received the vaccination and then 99.9% of them never got the disease and didn’t need a “booster” to maintain the immunity the vaccine provided. The COVID vaccine doesn’t prevent the disease. How can it be called a vaccine if it doesn’t prevent the disease it’s targeting?

    4) EVERY SARS VACCINE trial ended at ferret trials (COVID is. SARS variant.). A ferret’s immune system is most similar to a human’s. There were two side effects as each vaccine went through these trials: death and immune system response disorder, which usually resulted in death from another infection due to a compromised immune system. Why were ferret trials skipped and this vaccine rushed to humans?

    5) Once 10 deaths are tied to a vaccine it is pulled. Over 250 professional athletes have DIED from cardiovascular episodes shortly after receiving their vaccine. The information is out there. We’ve lost over 100 boys under age 17 with myocarditis—- 100 young men —- dead —- who are not even high risk. Hundreds of women have miscarried or their children were stillborn. All of them vaccinated. Why are these vaccines still being administered?

    6) Whole populations, in this case, the world, have never been expected to be guinea pigs for experimental products, ie vaccines. Why is the world’s population being used as “ferrets” to test this experimental vaccine?

    And a final question, why did the Emergency Covid Act excuse Big Pharma from any financial responsibility due to injury or death from their products???

    Food for thought: these three Pharmaceutical Giants are expected to net trillions of dollars from their “vaccines”. Which begs one more question: Why would any government allow experimentation on their citizens, remove all liability from producer of said product, unless there was something for them?

    I’ve always believed you follow the money. If you think logically about the last two years and the lies and misinformation, a conclusion is very easy to draw. YOU CANT CLAIM SCIENCE IS YOUR IMPETUS FOR DECISIONS WHEN YOU DISPARAGE SCIENCE THAT PROVES YOUR HYPOTHESIS WAS WRONG AT ITS FOUNDATION AND CONTINUE TO MISINFORM THE PUBLIC WITHOUT EXPECTATION OF SOMETHING AT THE BACKSIDE OF THE CIRCUS OF FEAR YOU SET INTO MOTION.

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    1. "How did this vaccine go from inception to injection in under a year??"

      For the same reason that the United States was able to go from virtually nothing to building 60,000 aircraft per year and large numbers of aircraft carriers after WWII started. The United States (and the world generally) has enormous intellectual, financial and industrial resources available to apply to an urgent problem.

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  22. Brilliant! "You NEVER sacrifice personal liberty and freedom for the collective good" If Australians understood this point, life here would be a whole lot more bearable.

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