Well, at least it’s some form of mia culpa, but a day late and a dollar short. Some observers, like John Ioannidis, noticed very early on that there were flaws in the narrative. By the summer of 2020, it was obvious to anyone willing to look that the story did not hold together.
"but for a time it seemed like that must be true."
I never did for one second it would.
"After all, the vaccines were so damned effective. For example, in clinical trials Pfizer’s Covid vaccine was shown to prevent 95% of infections. "
And this is why. Early on, there was a study in The Lancet that showed the '95% effective' claim was the ARR which always looks better. In reality, the more accurate figure is the RRR. Which was in the 1-3% range. The CCCA put out a concise video explaining this clearly.
These experimental 'vaccines' were DOA in my view. They may have conferred some protection for about 15 minutes but at this point, with so many having been infected (and with revelations his 'novel' virus has been around since at least 2019 and maybe even 2018 - which obliterates the argument we had no immunity if true), what's the point of all this anymore?
I got 2 jabs, 1 booster because of co-morbidities and I was told I wouldn't die.
I didn't want it as I had been reading conflicting advice, but jacinda said she was the podium of truth.
It seems the CDC, FDA and others have not been truthful with us and mortality is way up.
I want people on jail or excecuted if they lied. I don't care who they are.
We were led to believe we were vulnerable and forced/Coerced into being violated.
Here in NZ, The Mandates sacked nurses, doctors, teachers, Policeman, defence force people and untold others out of their jobs with all the dislocation that brings to families and children.
I want revenge for those people and for the deaths that needen't have happened and for all those suffering Long Covid and adverse effects.
I'm just an ordinary guy, my country and society is damaged, Lives have been devestated and 120 people are to blame.
what is appalling is that millions of medical professionals cowardly failed to stand up for naturally acquired immunity. When the count of positive persons everyday was rising and then waned, media continued to snuff out the truth telling professionals of many disciplines, that it was their naturally acquired immunity that was the “wall” protection you and I. That continues to protect the public. Not masks, not distancing, no lockdowns, not testing...all of which has had a detrimental effect on our world, harming out children psychologically more so. Mass formation was created. Knowingly for profit is my and million’s opinion.
Robust immunity of naturally acquired immunity has demonstrated the most protection of all. Everyone I know, who was vaccinated for Covid, got Covid. A great product for the profiteers only wouldn’t you agree? - In the billions of dollars, hoaxing and continuing to spread mistruths concerning by not disclosing ALL the adverse effects including tens of thousands of deaths this product is associated. Young people and professionals athletes are collapsing, many injured for the rest if their life! Do you think Fauci or Pfizer cares while they are rolling in the millions of dollars profit they knew they would make? This program has to immediately cease.
No one should ever be coerced or made to do something again their God given will.
Take a stand and don’t comply to those using you and our children for profit. My God, when is enough harm done enough?
Thank you for your comment. I agree that it is ridiculous that infection-acquired immunity was not recognized and continues to be largely unrecognized in guidelines and mandates. Not only does this not make sense, I think it also further undermines trust in public health.
Thank you for taking the time to compose this. I am very concerned about the politicians and health officials still in power who have the ability to mandate these things. In Washington state, first responders were fired for refusing the vaccine. Even though it's no longer required for their jobs, no one has apologized or offered them their old jobs back.
Additionally, this summer our governor has a new directive that mandates for employees at state cabinet agencies "all new employees to be fully up-to-date on their COVID-19 vaccination prior to starting work, including any recommended boosters." Edit: a month later, he rescinded this directive and revised it to say that employees would be incentivized to get boosters.
Remember this when these people run for national positions.
I agree that this is a problem. As Dr. Prasad has said several times, perhaps an even bigger problem is that small organizations feel empowered to mandate -- schools, clubs, summer camps, etc. These organizations are unlikely to have the requisite expertise, and there are misaligned incentives -- e.g. a college instituting a vaccine mandate will be hyper-focused on potential benefits during a three-month window, but might be unconcerned about any possible long-term implications.
Really? How exactly do mandates work, short of actually forcibly restraining people against their consent, or forcing them into penury? The whole idea was deeply flawed and fascistic: my body is my body, not a chemical experiment.
I hear you are strongly anti-mandate. Clearly, there are some who are completely opposed to any mandate on principle. I suspect others who were always opposed to Covid vaccine mandates might just require a higher bar. For example, imagine a virus that was very lethal, say 30% and very contagious. And imagine we had a vaccine that offered sterilizing immunity and a "good" safety profile, would you still object?
Thank you Dr. Fenyves for the article and your follow up post. I also disagree with your "95% effective" when most of my friends got the virus after the jab and was a contagious as anyone. But, I do agree that the most important message is that we need to come together to revamp a healthcare system that is blatantly corrupt.
Thank you for your comment. Yes, initially I thought that by Covid laying bare the inefficiencies of our healthcare system, there was going to be more public appetite for reform. I don't think that is true anymore.
In reading the comments, we all lament so much was forced on society by what now seems to be obvious centralized opinion by bureaucrats who long ago left the science despite credentials. At first we were all quite unsure about what this "novel" coronavirus was capable of doing. Data were sparse. The miracle of a vaccine arrived with propaganda to assert it's utility.
As time moved on many became aware of data that suggested many discrepancies with what we had been told. But all dissent was squashed by those same bureaucrats who seemed to believe any vaccine hesitancy would increase the death count. I doubt they ever really examined the data at all. And we now know they refused to examine the VAERS data.
Those same officials still cling to errors of judgement and refuse to admit to those errors. It's good to see many professionals, like our authors who speak out here. But many schools and other institutions are still demanding more to become vaccinated. And in front of the California governor we have an actual law designed to threaten any professional who doesn't follow dogma already proven to be wrong. The truth has not reached all corners. It requires some adult supervision to arrive at the highest levels of the NIH to wring that truth out to the public.
Preventing transmission was not a trial endpoint. Even Birx admitted she expected the vaccine would not halt transmission. County data was clear in June/July showing earliest vaccinated were getting infected...and mandates just kept being pushed harder and harder as that amount got higher and higher. Further, we had evidence by the time vaccines rolled out that this virus was already here far before we were told it was...esp in NY where people are coming and going every day from all around the world. Even Cuomo told us early in March of '20 that many of us would get the virus and not know it, and the elderly and those w/certain health conditions (which are always at some risk w/respiratory virus) were the ones who needed to worry. Interestingly, that is still the case. It was always the case. There was never any excuse for this. But moving forward, we need to ensure fewer people, particularly young people, develop these preventable conditions that predispose them to illness and bad outcomes so that we have the resources for those with non-preventable conditions. That is what I consider progressive. We can't all be slaves, financially and otherwise, to those with preventable conditions (that seem to be perpetuated by certain groups who profit from them)...and that is where we are right now. I'm sad that many of the "kids" in my family have grown up, my grandmother is starting to lose her mind...I've lost three separate years of holidays and time with my family that I will never get back. Financial gain, career gain, personal gain lost as well...Severe financial turmoil to come. What is being done to prevent it from happening again?
Yes, preventing transmission was not an endpoint, but it does seem to me that for a short period, the vaccines probably did slow transmission in a meaningful way. Clearly, that ended with Omicron -- whatever impact the vaccines had on Omicron transmission (if any) was a drop in the bucket. I agree strongly with your second point -- take the money you are spending on boosters for the young, and spend that on increasing access to good quality food and exercise programs. Not only will you lower their risk of complicated Covid, but you will also lower their risk of bad health in general and reduce their future healthcare costs.
Truth is there is no data showing that in the big picture, that the shot did that. There's examples of minuscule cherry picking of dates and places that can be manipulated to match that "seems to me", but the data was never there.
I have some leeway for people who didn't have TIME to pay attention to actual data instead of mainstream media. I was lucky, I was only working part-time in early 2020 and had all the time in the world to pay attention to data.
No, there was no double-blind placebo controlled RCT demonstrating that Covid vaccines have an impact on transmission, but there were observations studies, such as the two links pasted below. So, you have data (admittedly imperfect) and plausibility (a vaccine well-matched to the circulating strain), so I say "seems to me" to indicate that I do believe that vaccines probably reduced transmission with earlier strains, while acknowledging that this is not irrefutable. Now, I will concede that, given what I now know about how these vaccines work, that reduced transmission was likely transient, existing soon after the vaccines were given while circulating antibodies were high, and then dissipating as antibody levels waned -- I offer this as a guess. Furthermore, maybe what you are suggesting is that "seems to me" is not a level of evidence sufficient to justify a mandate, and that I do agree with.
In regards to honesty/transparency, you're getting closer.
Post-vaccination there's a +/- 2 week period where outcomes are worse.
Months 1-2, while iG antibody levels are at maximum levels, sure, there is some degree of reduction.
Month 3 quick waning
Then such waning as to be near useless iG antibody wise. As for other less specific immunity, that seemed to carry through as per with catching it.
This means total efficacy time is under two months.
My point is we KNEW all this BEFORE SCV2.
As the saying goes: "Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence".
With Coronaviruses, given that we KNEW immunity was a crap shoot, when the governments approved this medical experiment and propagandised it as a 95% effective at blocking all contagion, that was an Extraordinary claim, the burden of proof for efficacy needed Extraordinary evidence, (they didn't even complete the non-treatment arm!), and anyone paying attention knew that to not be the case.
What none of the Sensible Medicine writers have had the courage to say is this:
"I was not well informed about previous coronavirus vaccine attempts and the thin nature of coronavirus immunity, this lack of information led me to be suckered into the miraculous claims propagandised by profit seeking corporations. I'm sorry I mislead people"
That's what the health experts need to say to regain trust of the population.
We knew that coronavirus vaccinations weren't very functional before SCV2 arrived. Coronaviruses were always known to be annoying and not good candidates for vaccines:
-high mutation rates
-short shelf-life of iG antibodies
-vast animal reservoir
We've known this since decades of research in creating cold vaccines
We've known this more acutely since MERS and SARS1
This vaccine was always going to be of limited use. It's a disgrace that anyone in the fields of health or biology could have believed in miracles and promises instead of long term data and facts.
No, I actually agree with current thought and your thoughts. My only disagreement is that we didn't know what to expect at the beginning and there was a lot of fear and exaggeration put forth. You are correct, things have changed.
It's not about agreeing or disagreeing today, it's about what was known when. We knew coronavirus vaccines were inefficient before SCV2 arrived, and we knew lethality was generally limited to over 70s from he very outset, but Iranian and Italian data during March 2020 made that firm. There's been not one single surprises since April 2020. All talk of "I changed my mind cuz the science changed" during 2021/2022 is nonsensical.
Most people were NOT following evidence, most people were following tv reports and their ticker tapes at the bottom of the screen. TV does not convey truth. We've known official messaging is wrong for decades, on health, on biodiversity, on climate, and war efforts, on corporate greed, etc.
This was not a pandemic of a virus, it was a pandemic of gullibility. This is one of the reasons some authors posit we are living in a new Dark Age, because everybody is just following the narrative, performing their little bit of the job, and people have chosen to NOT know what was already known. People live in bubbles, disconnected from the bigger picture. Philosophically speaking, it's been very dark. Nothing good follows.
Doctors are caught in a trap composed of irrational fear and decisions made while in the grip of fear. In order to extricate themselves, they will have to first acknowledge that they fell prey to irrational fear. That takes self-examination, but I don't think that that course is taught in med school.
"Know thyself."
I was conversing with an IM doc who denied being gripped by fear and implied that she "followed the science." Of course, I know the science and she does not wrt masking and social distancing. I'm in field and she isn't. But she was absolutely certain. Religiously certain. With her hands tightly fastened over her eyes. Blind faith.
The first step to escaping a trap is to realize that you have been caught. Then you have to look at the implications of the trap--did you make things worse by struggling in the trap and making panicked decisions? Then you consider how you might have been trapped and whether the trap was natural or artificial. This is the route to sanity and escape from the public health cult and its trap.
Thanks Tom. I honestly was not gripped by fear. I have been seeing Covid patients in person since March of 2020 and acclimated to that risk pretty quickly. Of course, I have (relative) youth and good health on my side. I do, however, think that there is something to fact that our response was led by an 80-year-old, for whom the threat of Covid loomed quite large.
Good for you! But, initially, was the public health response appropriate for the actual risk to the under 70 y.o. group, which was known in late spring? And how many docs _were_ gripped by fear? How many saw colleagues die from covid? How many saw staff die from covid? Or maybe, in New York hospitals, covid was blamed for deaths caused by ventilation protocols, which would still increase the fear. Right?
The medical community will need to take the lead back from public health and analyze this pandemic response disaster. People will understand if you say, "I was panicked along with everyone else." They won't understand if you say, "I was just following orders." They will understand (somewhat) if you say, "I was coerced and couldn't give my honest medical opinion. We need to make certain that doctors are protected from coercion by employers and medical review boards to not give their honest medical opinion."
Doctors can tell the public, "Pharma, hospital associations, and county health authorities have been lobbying state legislatures to prevent medical freedom of speech and freedom to prescribe laws from being passed in order to keep doctors silenced and under pharma's and hospitals' thumb." I have heard this from freedom-friendly legislators and I have seen someone from an organization of county health authorities speaking against a bill to protect doctors' freedom to prescribe.
Then there's the medical muzzling act in California that has been or is expected to be signed where doctors can lose their license simply for violating some arbitrary part of the public health narrative.
"He initially believed, like so many, that COVID vaccines would halt transmission, and supported mandates".
Even if these vaccines would halt transmission and they were perfect in every possible sense, you cannot mandate any medical product unless you are an Primitive Savage. Your right over the body of somebody else is none. You should feel ashamed of yourselves, all of you.
PS: Universal Justice does exist and you will meet her. I am not going to comment in here anymore, I don't like to talk to Primitive Savages. You are disgusting.
Any argument in favor of mandates was, at the time, completely unsupported by valid evidence. That shortcoming cannot be glossed over, even with a mea culpa. The supposed ‘communal benefit’ was, in fact a lie, predicated on non-existent data. That’s a fundamental blind spot that is glaring, in my opinion.
The second fundamental problem, is that this pandemic was, from the very outset, misrepresented in terms of its urgency and risk of harm to the public. The likely IFR was clearly demonstrated quite early on by Dr. Ioannidis. His work didn’t make it to the ears of most, but was a very early indication of the distortions at play. Advocating mandating anything in the context of something with an IFR so low is not only bad policy and bad medicine, it’s an ethical nightmare.
Respectfully, while I applaud your apparent change of heart, I believe there’s more painful self-reflection required. There are fundamental problems with your train of thought here, as demonstrated by your written words. This is not meant in any way, shape, or form to be trolling: it is an honest assessment of what I conclude to be basic underlying problems that seem unaddressed.
I hope you will reflect on this, as the roots of the problems we face run very very deep and cannot be papered over.
Well, at least it’s some form of mia culpa, but a day late and a dollar short. Some observers, like John Ioannidis, noticed very early on that there were flaws in the narrative. By the summer of 2020, it was obvious to anyone willing to look that the story did not hold together.
I believe in Olive branches. Thank you.
"but for a time it seemed like that must be true."
I never did for one second it would.
"After all, the vaccines were so damned effective. For example, in clinical trials Pfizer’s Covid vaccine was shown to prevent 95% of infections. "
And this is why. Early on, there was a study in The Lancet that showed the '95% effective' claim was the ARR which always looks better. In reality, the more accurate figure is the RRR. Which was in the 1-3% range. The CCCA put out a concise video explaining this clearly.
These experimental 'vaccines' were DOA in my view. They may have conferred some protection for about 15 minutes but at this point, with so many having been infected (and with revelations his 'novel' virus has been around since at least 2019 and maybe even 2018 - which obliterates the argument we had no immunity if true), what's the point of all this anymore?
Is it not time to move on?
Oh. Right. They're not done ka-chinging.
Thanks for the write up.
Cheers.
I got 2 jabs, 1 booster because of co-morbidities and I was told I wouldn't die.
I didn't want it as I had been reading conflicting advice, but jacinda said she was the podium of truth.
It seems the CDC, FDA and others have not been truthful with us and mortality is way up.
I want people on jail or excecuted if they lied. I don't care who they are.
We were led to believe we were vulnerable and forced/Coerced into being violated.
Here in NZ, The Mandates sacked nurses, doctors, teachers, Policeman, defence force people and untold others out of their jobs with all the dislocation that brings to families and children.
I want revenge for those people and for the deaths that needen't have happened and for all those suffering Long Covid and adverse effects.
I'm just an ordinary guy, my country and society is damaged, Lives have been devestated and 120 people are to blame.
Plus their so called experts.
It was an EXPERIMENTAL vaccine stupid. From the start, it was never right to mandate that anyone take part in a medical experiment.
Thank you for your article. However,
what is appalling is that millions of medical professionals cowardly failed to stand up for naturally acquired immunity. When the count of positive persons everyday was rising and then waned, media continued to snuff out the truth telling professionals of many disciplines, that it was their naturally acquired immunity that was the “wall” protection you and I. That continues to protect the public. Not masks, not distancing, no lockdowns, not testing...all of which has had a detrimental effect on our world, harming out children psychologically more so. Mass formation was created. Knowingly for profit is my and million’s opinion.
Robust immunity of naturally acquired immunity has demonstrated the most protection of all. Everyone I know, who was vaccinated for Covid, got Covid. A great product for the profiteers only wouldn’t you agree? - In the billions of dollars, hoaxing and continuing to spread mistruths concerning by not disclosing ALL the adverse effects including tens of thousands of deaths this product is associated. Young people and professionals athletes are collapsing, many injured for the rest if their life! Do you think Fauci or Pfizer cares while they are rolling in the millions of dollars profit they knew they would make? This program has to immediately cease.
No one should ever be coerced or made to do something again their God given will.
Take a stand and don’t comply to those using you and our children for profit. My God, when is enough harm done enough?
Thank you for your comment. I agree that it is ridiculous that infection-acquired immunity was not recognized and continues to be largely unrecognized in guidelines and mandates. Not only does this not make sense, I think it also further undermines trust in public health.
Thank you for taking the time to compose this. I am very concerned about the politicians and health officials still in power who have the ability to mandate these things. In Washington state, first responders were fired for refusing the vaccine. Even though it's no longer required for their jobs, no one has apologized or offered them their old jobs back.
Additionally, this summer our governor has a new directive that mandates for employees at state cabinet agencies "all new employees to be fully up-to-date on their COVID-19 vaccination prior to starting work, including any recommended boosters." Edit: a month later, he rescinded this directive and revised it to say that employees would be incentivized to get boosters.
Remember this when these people run for national positions.
I agree that this is a problem. As Dr. Prasad has said several times, perhaps an even bigger problem is that small organizations feel empowered to mandate -- schools, clubs, summer camps, etc. These organizations are unlikely to have the requisite expertise, and there are misaligned incentives -- e.g. a college instituting a vaccine mandate will be hyper-focused on potential benefits during a three-month window, but might be unconcerned about any possible long-term implications.
Really? How exactly do mandates work, short of actually forcibly restraining people against their consent, or forcing them into penury? The whole idea was deeply flawed and fascistic: my body is my body, not a chemical experiment.
I hear you are strongly anti-mandate. Clearly, there are some who are completely opposed to any mandate on principle. I suspect others who were always opposed to Covid vaccine mandates might just require a higher bar. For example, imagine a virus that was very lethal, say 30% and very contagious. And imagine we had a vaccine that offered sterilizing immunity and a "good" safety profile, would you still object?
Yes. Because all vaccines have some risk of bodily harm, and because that risk has to be personal.
It's much the same with so-called dangerous sports like e.g. climbing Everest: ultimately people know the risks and make up their own mind.
Thank you Dr. Fenyves for the article and your follow up post. I also disagree with your "95% effective" when most of my friends got the virus after the jab and was a contagious as anyone. But, I do agree that the most important message is that we need to come together to revamp a healthcare system that is blatantly corrupt.
Thank you for your comment. Yes, initially I thought that by Covid laying bare the inefficiencies of our healthcare system, there was going to be more public appetite for reform. I don't think that is true anymore.
Good point. Maybe when the rest of the VAERS proves true it will say some. But you may, unfortunately be right.
In reading the comments, we all lament so much was forced on society by what now seems to be obvious centralized opinion by bureaucrats who long ago left the science despite credentials. At first we were all quite unsure about what this "novel" coronavirus was capable of doing. Data were sparse. The miracle of a vaccine arrived with propaganda to assert it's utility.
As time moved on many became aware of data that suggested many discrepancies with what we had been told. But all dissent was squashed by those same bureaucrats who seemed to believe any vaccine hesitancy would increase the death count. I doubt they ever really examined the data at all. And we now know they refused to examine the VAERS data.
Those same officials still cling to errors of judgement and refuse to admit to those errors. It's good to see many professionals, like our authors who speak out here. But many schools and other institutions are still demanding more to become vaccinated. And in front of the California governor we have an actual law designed to threaten any professional who doesn't follow dogma already proven to be wrong. The truth has not reached all corners. It requires some adult supervision to arrive at the highest levels of the NIH to wring that truth out to the public.
"Unfortunately, his thoughts on vaccine mandates do not necessarily represent the views of his employer."
Nice one. :)
Preventing transmission was not a trial endpoint. Even Birx admitted she expected the vaccine would not halt transmission. County data was clear in June/July showing earliest vaccinated were getting infected...and mandates just kept being pushed harder and harder as that amount got higher and higher. Further, we had evidence by the time vaccines rolled out that this virus was already here far before we were told it was...esp in NY where people are coming and going every day from all around the world. Even Cuomo told us early in March of '20 that many of us would get the virus and not know it, and the elderly and those w/certain health conditions (which are always at some risk w/respiratory virus) were the ones who needed to worry. Interestingly, that is still the case. It was always the case. There was never any excuse for this. But moving forward, we need to ensure fewer people, particularly young people, develop these preventable conditions that predispose them to illness and bad outcomes so that we have the resources for those with non-preventable conditions. That is what I consider progressive. We can't all be slaves, financially and otherwise, to those with preventable conditions (that seem to be perpetuated by certain groups who profit from them)...and that is where we are right now. I'm sad that many of the "kids" in my family have grown up, my grandmother is starting to lose her mind...I've lost three separate years of holidays and time with my family that I will never get back. Financial gain, career gain, personal gain lost as well...Severe financial turmoil to come. What is being done to prevent it from happening again?
Yes, preventing transmission was not an endpoint, but it does seem to me that for a short period, the vaccines probably did slow transmission in a meaningful way. Clearly, that ended with Omicron -- whatever impact the vaccines had on Omicron transmission (if any) was a drop in the bucket. I agree strongly with your second point -- take the money you are spending on boosters for the young, and spend that on increasing access to good quality food and exercise programs. Not only will you lower their risk of complicated Covid, but you will also lower their risk of bad health in general and reduce their future healthcare costs.
Truth is there is no data showing that in the big picture, that the shot did that. There's examples of minuscule cherry picking of dates and places that can be manipulated to match that "seems to me", but the data was never there.
I have some leeway for people who didn't have TIME to pay attention to actual data instead of mainstream media. I was lucky, I was only working part-time in early 2020 and had all the time in the world to pay attention to data.
The data was never worrisome.
No, there was no double-blind placebo controlled RCT demonstrating that Covid vaccines have an impact on transmission, but there were observations studies, such as the two links pasted below. So, you have data (admittedly imperfect) and plausibility (a vaccine well-matched to the circulating strain), so I say "seems to me" to indicate that I do believe that vaccines probably reduced transmission with earlier strains, while acknowledging that this is not irrefutable. Now, I will concede that, given what I now know about how these vaccines work, that reduced transmission was likely transient, existing soon after the vaccines were given while circulating antibodies were high, and then dissipating as antibody levels waned -- I offer this as a guess. Furthermore, maybe what you are suggesting is that "seems to me" is not a level of evidence sufficient to justify a mandate, and that I do agree with.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2106757
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmc2107717
In regards to honesty/transparency, you're getting closer.
Post-vaccination there's a +/- 2 week period where outcomes are worse.
Months 1-2, while iG antibody levels are at maximum levels, sure, there is some degree of reduction.
Month 3 quick waning
Then such waning as to be near useless iG antibody wise. As for other less specific immunity, that seemed to carry through as per with catching it.
This means total efficacy time is under two months.
My point is we KNEW all this BEFORE SCV2.
As the saying goes: "Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence".
With Coronaviruses, given that we KNEW immunity was a crap shoot, when the governments approved this medical experiment and propagandised it as a 95% effective at blocking all contagion, that was an Extraordinary claim, the burden of proof for efficacy needed Extraordinary evidence, (they didn't even complete the non-treatment arm!), and anyone paying attention knew that to not be the case.
What none of the Sensible Medicine writers have had the courage to say is this:
"I was not well informed about previous coronavirus vaccine attempts and the thin nature of coronavirus immunity, this lack of information led me to be suckered into the miraculous claims propagandised by profit seeking corporations. I'm sorry I mislead people"
That's what the health experts need to say to regain trust of the population.
Ikr. Seems like we're going to be submerged by a wave of "I didn't know" which is a hell of a far cry from "I was wrong".
The problem is that at the time of early 2021 none of this new info was available
We knew that coronavirus vaccinations weren't very functional before SCV2 arrived. Coronaviruses were always known to be annoying and not good candidates for vaccines:
-high mutation rates
-short shelf-life of iG antibodies
-vast animal reservoir
We've known this since decades of research in creating cold vaccines
We've known this more acutely since MERS and SARS1
This vaccine was always going to be of limited use. It's a disgrace that anyone in the fields of health or biology could have believed in miracles and promises instead of long term data and facts.
again, at the time there were no long term data nor facts. This info could only be gleaned as time passed and data accumulated
Sorry but no, you're only clinging to your fear based preconceptions.
No, I actually agree with current thought and your thoughts. My only disagreement is that we didn't know what to expect at the beginning and there was a lot of fear and exaggeration put forth. You are correct, things have changed.
It's not about agreeing or disagreeing today, it's about what was known when. We knew coronavirus vaccines were inefficient before SCV2 arrived, and we knew lethality was generally limited to over 70s from he very outset, but Iranian and Italian data during March 2020 made that firm. There's been not one single surprises since April 2020. All talk of "I changed my mind cuz the science changed" during 2021/2022 is nonsensical.
Most people were NOT following evidence, most people were following tv reports and their ticker tapes at the bottom of the screen. TV does not convey truth. We've known official messaging is wrong for decades, on health, on biodiversity, on climate, and war efforts, on corporate greed, etc.
This was not a pandemic of a virus, it was a pandemic of gullibility. This is one of the reasons some authors posit we are living in a new Dark Age, because everybody is just following the narrative, performing their little bit of the job, and people have chosen to NOT know what was already known. People live in bubbles, disconnected from the bigger picture. Philosophically speaking, it's been very dark. Nothing good follows.
Doctors are caught in a trap composed of irrational fear and decisions made while in the grip of fear. In order to extricate themselves, they will have to first acknowledge that they fell prey to irrational fear. That takes self-examination, but I don't think that that course is taught in med school.
"Know thyself."
I was conversing with an IM doc who denied being gripped by fear and implied that she "followed the science." Of course, I know the science and she does not wrt masking and social distancing. I'm in field and she isn't. But she was absolutely certain. Religiously certain. With her hands tightly fastened over her eyes. Blind faith.
The first step to escaping a trap is to realize that you have been caught. Then you have to look at the implications of the trap--did you make things worse by struggling in the trap and making panicked decisions? Then you consider how you might have been trapped and whether the trap was natural or artificial. This is the route to sanity and escape from the public health cult and its trap.
Thanks Tom. I honestly was not gripped by fear. I have been seeing Covid patients in person since March of 2020 and acclimated to that risk pretty quickly. Of course, I have (relative) youth and good health on my side. I do, however, think that there is something to fact that our response was led by an 80-year-old, for whom the threat of Covid loomed quite large.
Good for you! But, initially, was the public health response appropriate for the actual risk to the under 70 y.o. group, which was known in late spring? And how many docs _were_ gripped by fear? How many saw colleagues die from covid? How many saw staff die from covid? Or maybe, in New York hospitals, covid was blamed for deaths caused by ventilation protocols, which would still increase the fear. Right?
The medical community will need to take the lead back from public health and analyze this pandemic response disaster. People will understand if you say, "I was panicked along with everyone else." They won't understand if you say, "I was just following orders." They will understand (somewhat) if you say, "I was coerced and couldn't give my honest medical opinion. We need to make certain that doctors are protected from coercion by employers and medical review boards to not give their honest medical opinion."
Doctors can tell the public, "Pharma, hospital associations, and county health authorities have been lobbying state legislatures to prevent medical freedom of speech and freedom to prescribe laws from being passed in order to keep doctors silenced and under pharma's and hospitals' thumb." I have heard this from freedom-friendly legislators and I have seen someone from an organization of county health authorities speaking against a bill to protect doctors' freedom to prescribe.
Then there's the medical muzzling act in California that has been or is expected to be signed where doctors can lose their license simply for violating some arbitrary part of the public health narrative.
Hi,
"He initially believed, like so many, that COVID vaccines would halt transmission, and supported mandates".
Even if these vaccines would halt transmission and they were perfect in every possible sense, you cannot mandate any medical product unless you are an Primitive Savage. Your right over the body of somebody else is none. You should feel ashamed of yourselves, all of you.
PS: Universal Justice does exist and you will meet her. I am not going to comment in here anymore, I don't like to talk to Primitive Savages. You are disgusting.
Kind regards,
Agu.
Ouch. I thought my wife was the only one who considered me a primitive savage.
Any argument in favor of mandates was, at the time, completely unsupported by valid evidence. That shortcoming cannot be glossed over, even with a mea culpa. The supposed ‘communal benefit’ was, in fact a lie, predicated on non-existent data. That’s a fundamental blind spot that is glaring, in my opinion.
The second fundamental problem, is that this pandemic was, from the very outset, misrepresented in terms of its urgency and risk of harm to the public. The likely IFR was clearly demonstrated quite early on by Dr. Ioannidis. His work didn’t make it to the ears of most, but was a very early indication of the distortions at play. Advocating mandating anything in the context of something with an IFR so low is not only bad policy and bad medicine, it’s an ethical nightmare.
Respectfully, while I applaud your apparent change of heart, I believe there’s more painful self-reflection required. There are fundamental problems with your train of thought here, as demonstrated by your written words. This is not meant in any way, shape, or form to be trolling: it is an honest assessment of what I conclude to be basic underlying problems that seem unaddressed.
I hope you will reflect on this, as the roots of the problems we face run very very deep and cannot be papered over.