I listened to the Bret Weinstein podcast w/ Steve and Robert Malone. Malone sounded fairly sober, but Steve didn't. If I recall correctly he put a lot of emphasis on the difference between flu and covid vaccines when it comes to VAERS numbers. I gather the numbers are indeed dramatically different but I assume (1) because covid vaccines …
I listened to the Bret Weinstein podcast w/ Steve and Robert Malone. Malone sounded fairly sober, but Steve didn't. If I recall correctly he put a lot of emphasis on the difference between flu and covid vaccines when it comes to VAERS numbers. I gather the numbers are indeed dramatically different but I assume (1) because covid vaccines are under emergency use authorization, the VAERS reporting guidelines are broader; and (2) people are just very conscious of the novelty of the covid vaccine and so more attentive to post-vaccine events that could conceivably be attributed to it. Is that the basic explanation?
Don't think #1 is right (I think VAERS works the same regardless), but #2 is spot on. Plus, I'd add three other factors:
1. With the exception of the flu vaccine, most vaccines are given to young people whose immune systems are more robust, less likely to have bad side effects, and less likely to report them when they do.
2. People are used to getting flu vaccines which makes our bodies more accustomed to them and less likely to have novel reactions.
3. The politicization of everything creates incentives for increased reporting (whether it is people reporting marginal cases or flat our fake reports).
So it's not at all surprising to me that VAERS reports have spiked.
That said, I certainly think it's concerning and should be investigated. Steve and Robert could be right that there are real issues with the vaccines. I don't think that possibility should be ruled out. However, the fact that the controlled trials didn't have major issues makes me skeptical And the falling death rates among the vaccinated certainly has me convinced at this point that the dangers of not vaccinating are more severe than the risk of possible side effects (at least for most folks). So I strongly recommend that people continue to get vaccinated. But I do hope the CDC or FDA or whoever is responsible is putting a lot of resources into investigating the VAERS reports. If they're not (and I don't know that they are) that IS a story that journalists should be chasing and writing about.
Until that happens, however, there isn't yet enough evidence to justify the sweeping anti-vaccine arguments that Steve has been spewing, which run the spectrum from alarmist to flat out wrong. Unfortunately, I think he is so frustrated that the medical community has not embraced the research he funded on fluvoxamine and is instead telling people to get vaccinated that his frustration has clouded his judgement about the vaccines. To play armchair psychologist, I think his self-image of himself as a heroic entrepreneur who has helped save the world through fluvoxamine is now tied up in his mind with the vaccines failing and people turning to fluvoxamine and ivermectin as treatments. So he now latches on to any anti-vaccine argument regardless of how flimsy.
It's what I mean when I say he has become a crackpot on this issue, and my sense is from your description is that Eric Weinstein is going through something similar. His self-image is so tied up with being the smartest person in the room who sees the grand theory that no one else can see that anything that any setback that threatens that image he credits to a conspiracy theory against him. Unfortunately, that way lies crackpottery.
It's too bad because he and Steve are both smart guys who have made some real contributions to the world (at least I know Steve has). Wish they could be satisfied with that.
Yet that makes sense as a VAERS explanation. (I did read in a USA Today piece that the reporting guidelines are broader as well, but it wasn't a well written piece and I'm not sure they got that right.)
To put a line under one point above Robert, I do wish some journalist (maybe you?) would do the legwork to contact the CDC/FDA and write a piece about how they typically handle reports into VAERS. Do they generally investigate these reports? Do they try to evaluate how many are credible? How are they handling the spike in reports into VAERS with the COVID vaccines?
I think these are important questions, but while I have seen debunkings of the idea that a spike in VAERS reports is proof of a problem, I haven't seen anything that answers the questions above. And until there are answers to those questions, I think vaccine skeptics have legitimate reasons for some doubts.
I listened to the Bret Weinstein podcast w/ Steve and Robert Malone. Malone sounded fairly sober, but Steve didn't. If I recall correctly he put a lot of emphasis on the difference between flu and covid vaccines when it comes to VAERS numbers. I gather the numbers are indeed dramatically different but I assume (1) because covid vaccines are under emergency use authorization, the VAERS reporting guidelines are broader; and (2) people are just very conscious of the novelty of the covid vaccine and so more attentive to post-vaccine events that could conceivably be attributed to it. Is that the basic explanation?
Don't think #1 is right (I think VAERS works the same regardless), but #2 is spot on. Plus, I'd add three other factors:
1. With the exception of the flu vaccine, most vaccines are given to young people whose immune systems are more robust, less likely to have bad side effects, and less likely to report them when they do.
2. People are used to getting flu vaccines which makes our bodies more accustomed to them and less likely to have novel reactions.
3. The politicization of everything creates incentives for increased reporting (whether it is people reporting marginal cases or flat our fake reports).
So it's not at all surprising to me that VAERS reports have spiked.
That said, I certainly think it's concerning and should be investigated. Steve and Robert could be right that there are real issues with the vaccines. I don't think that possibility should be ruled out. However, the fact that the controlled trials didn't have major issues makes me skeptical And the falling death rates among the vaccinated certainly has me convinced at this point that the dangers of not vaccinating are more severe than the risk of possible side effects (at least for most folks). So I strongly recommend that people continue to get vaccinated. But I do hope the CDC or FDA or whoever is responsible is putting a lot of resources into investigating the VAERS reports. If they're not (and I don't know that they are) that IS a story that journalists should be chasing and writing about.
Until that happens, however, there isn't yet enough evidence to justify the sweeping anti-vaccine arguments that Steve has been spewing, which run the spectrum from alarmist to flat out wrong. Unfortunately, I think he is so frustrated that the medical community has not embraced the research he funded on fluvoxamine and is instead telling people to get vaccinated that his frustration has clouded his judgement about the vaccines. To play armchair psychologist, I think his self-image of himself as a heroic entrepreneur who has helped save the world through fluvoxamine is now tied up in his mind with the vaccines failing and people turning to fluvoxamine and ivermectin as treatments. So he now latches on to any anti-vaccine argument regardless of how flimsy.
It's what I mean when I say he has become a crackpot on this issue, and my sense is from your description is that Eric Weinstein is going through something similar. His self-image is so tied up with being the smartest person in the room who sees the grand theory that no one else can see that anything that any setback that threatens that image he credits to a conspiracy theory against him. Unfortunately, that way lies crackpottery.
It's too bad because he and Steve are both smart guys who have made some real contributions to the world (at least I know Steve has). Wish they could be satisfied with that.
Yet that makes sense as a VAERS explanation. (I did read in a USA Today piece that the reporting guidelines are broader as well, but it wasn't a well written piece and I'm not sure they got that right.)
To put a line under one point above Robert, I do wish some journalist (maybe you?) would do the legwork to contact the CDC/FDA and write a piece about how they typically handle reports into VAERS. Do they generally investigate these reports? Do they try to evaluate how many are credible? How are they handling the spike in reports into VAERS with the COVID vaccines?
I think these are important questions, but while I have seen debunkings of the idea that a spike in VAERS reports is proof of a problem, I haven't seen anything that answers the questions above. And until there are answers to those questions, I think vaccine skeptics have legitimate reasons for some doubts.