It’s crazy to me as a pediatrician. The big cliche we constantly hear in training, from med school through residency, is “children are not little adults.” Yet Covid comes along and the AAP and mindless majorities of pediatricians treat children… like little adults. Madness!
P.s. your analysis above also reminds me of the infamous leaked …
It’s crazy to me as a pediatrician. The big cliche we constantly hear in training, from med school through residency, is “children are not little adults.” Yet Covid comes along and the AAP and mindless majorities of pediatricians treat children… like little adults. Madness!
P.s. your analysis above also reminds me of the infamous leaked “hide the decline” emails from the global warming researchers a few years back. You can’t come up with the results you need to panic the population (and increase your funding) without deliberately manipulating the figures. It’s a clear sign of a guilty conscience. These people aren’t just wrong, they’re malicious.
Adrian, I am a retired pediatrician. I do not know a single other vaccine for which we use an entirely different formulation for infants and children compared to adults, except rarely for dose administration. There is something very strange from an immunologic point of view relating to the incidence of myocarditis in young males. We need to understand this phenomenon. The human immune system evolves from infancy to the elderly state. Children are much more susceptible to allergic reactions than the elderly. For some reason, adult females are at greatest risk for autoimmune diseases. We need to keep asking questions!
With this virus, there is a marked difference in susceptibility to severe disease over the span of life but we still need to protect the immunocompromised infant and child. Keep asking good questions without casting aspersion, if you can.
I appreciate the reply, and agree with the strangeness! I need to be better about casting aspersions, we should strive to put the best formulation on the motives of others, but at some point you have to call a spade a spade. For example, as the very kind and moderate Dr Prasad notes often, you can’t just look the other way at the amount of money pharma makes and how that corrupts doctors. When faced with researchers deliberately conflating statistics of 90 year olds and 18 year olds, the only apparent explanations are incompetence or some deliberate funny business. If they want to plead incompetence, they are free to do so : )
As for pediatric vaccines, I would say there are more differences beside formulation if you think about it. We give rota vaccines to 2 month olds but can’t start the series anymore if a kid is 4 month olds. That’s just a 2 month difference! But the cost/benefit changed significantly enough that you’re no longer supposed to give it. Similarly, you can give mmr to a 12 month old but it won’t count a few months earlier. And even though it’s supposedly very safe and effective, nobody in my clinic ever gets the yellow fever vaccine! I know I’m stating the obvious, but risk/benefit varies by age and location and a million other factors. Mandating Covid shots on children given the known risk/benefit at the time, let alone now, cannot be explained charitably, in my honest opinion.
Adrian, I totally agree with you about the advisability of COVID vaccines for most infants and children today. Exceptions might include a one year old whose sibling had a liver transplant last year and children who spend a lot of time with their elderly grandparents. The calculations of risk and benefits need to be individual.
It’s crazy to me as a pediatrician. The big cliche we constantly hear in training, from med school through residency, is “children are not little adults.” Yet Covid comes along and the AAP and mindless majorities of pediatricians treat children… like little adults. Madness!
P.s. your analysis above also reminds me of the infamous leaked “hide the decline” emails from the global warming researchers a few years back. You can’t come up with the results you need to panic the population (and increase your funding) without deliberately manipulating the figures. It’s a clear sign of a guilty conscience. These people aren’t just wrong, they’re malicious.
https://gaty.substack.com/
Adrian, I am a retired pediatrician. I do not know a single other vaccine for which we use an entirely different formulation for infants and children compared to adults, except rarely for dose administration. There is something very strange from an immunologic point of view relating to the incidence of myocarditis in young males. We need to understand this phenomenon. The human immune system evolves from infancy to the elderly state. Children are much more susceptible to allergic reactions than the elderly. For some reason, adult females are at greatest risk for autoimmune diseases. We need to keep asking questions!
With this virus, there is a marked difference in susceptibility to severe disease over the span of life but we still need to protect the immunocompromised infant and child. Keep asking good questions without casting aspersion, if you can.
I appreciate the reply, and agree with the strangeness! I need to be better about casting aspersions, we should strive to put the best formulation on the motives of others, but at some point you have to call a spade a spade. For example, as the very kind and moderate Dr Prasad notes often, you can’t just look the other way at the amount of money pharma makes and how that corrupts doctors. When faced with researchers deliberately conflating statistics of 90 year olds and 18 year olds, the only apparent explanations are incompetence or some deliberate funny business. If they want to plead incompetence, they are free to do so : )
As for pediatric vaccines, I would say there are more differences beside formulation if you think about it. We give rota vaccines to 2 month olds but can’t start the series anymore if a kid is 4 month olds. That’s just a 2 month difference! But the cost/benefit changed significantly enough that you’re no longer supposed to give it. Similarly, you can give mmr to a 12 month old but it won’t count a few months earlier. And even though it’s supposedly very safe and effective, nobody in my clinic ever gets the yellow fever vaccine! I know I’m stating the obvious, but risk/benefit varies by age and location and a million other factors. Mandating Covid shots on children given the known risk/benefit at the time, let alone now, cannot be explained charitably, in my honest opinion.
Adrian, I totally agree with you about the advisability of COVID vaccines for most infants and children today. Exceptions might include a one year old whose sibling had a liver transplant last year and children who spend a lot of time with their elderly grandparents. The calculations of risk and benefits need to be individual.