This is a link to a recent article by Karl Denninger. In it he is analyzing and commenting upon a peer-reviewed paper in Nature, the scientific journal. The authors of the paper present a very divergent view of the vaccines that you have not heard from MSM, the government, or the CDC. I found it very interesting. It's long-ish and technical, but worth the effort, I think. I'd like to hear what some of our medical/scientific members think of it.
https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=242205

quote:

Originally posted by wcb6092:
States Offer Beer, Cash Incentives As Vaccine Demand Softens

https://www.zerohedge.com/covi...ccine-demand-softens

Theses state’s seem to be challenging each other to see which one can be driven over the cliff first at Ludicrous Speed!

quote:

Originally posted by amals:
This is a link to a recent article by Karl Denninger. In it he is analyzing and commenting upon a peer-reviewed paper in Nature, the scientific journal. The authors of the paper present a very divergent view of the vaccines that you have not heard from MSM, the government, or the CDC. I found it very interesting. It's long-ish and technical, but worth the effort, I think. I'd like to hear what some of our medical/scientific members think of it.
https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=242205

I forwarded this article yesterday to an MD friend who now primarily practices Naturopathic and Holistic Health Medicine for his opinion on it and this was his reply -

“I read it and I think he’s pretty damn spot on, I knew most of this but he pulled it all together and collectively it’s even scarier than I thought......scarier meaning the stone cold ignorance or them knowing this and still doing it as part of the deep state big plan.”

Here is another article from Denninger that it pretty profound. There are two or three hyperlinks in the article that did not carry in the cut’n paste.

Do Stupid Things, Win Stupid Prizes

It's ok folks, it's very "rare".

Uh huh, sure it is.

High school senior Emma Burkey received her “one and done” Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine on March 20, and within two weeks was in an induced coma following seizures and clotting in her brain.

She’s making a slow recovery, having recently been transfered from the hospital to a rehabilitation center, and the first round of bills totaled $513,000. The 18-year-old’s family friends in the Las Vegas area started a GoFundMe account to help with medical expenses from the very rare vaccine reaction.

An 18 year old, according to the CDC, has a roughly 1/50,000 risk of being killed by Covid-19 assuming the FDA's and CDC's "standard of care" which prohibits the use of budesonide, ivermectin, monoclonal antibodies and a whole host of other drugs which we know work. One of them, budesonide, has a roughly 90% efficacy in preventing hospitalization (and of course death usually is preceded by that if you get Covid); the others also have some efficacy. Stacking just those three likely winds up around 95-99% effective, so your actual risk, if you're not a dumb-ass and are both young and get Covid-19 is more like 1/500,000.

And that's if you get Covid. The CDC says about 1/10 people have over a year's time, so your risk as a healthy 18 year old is approximately 1/5,000,000 since to be exposed to the risk of death you first must get the disease and that is not certain. Remember, according to the CDC if you die while Covid-19 positive then your death was caused by Covid-19, even though this is not scientifically proved. This is the same standard that VAERS uses for vaccine death; you died associated with receiving the shot; it is not proved it was caused, but if that's good enough for the CDC to claim the Coof killed you then it sure as hell is good enough to claim the vaccine killed you.

By the CDCs VAERS numbers and the number of delivered shots into arms the risk of the shot killing you is approximately 1/45,000 and if you take the shot the hazard is 100% probable to be undertaken, obviously. So if you're not specifically morbid the shot is one hundred times more dangerous than the disease.

Oh, and we know the VAERS reports are wildly understated. Why? Because it's a voluntary system; there is no mandate on any person or health provider to report potential adverse connected effects. While you (as the impacted individual) can report to the system obvious doing that if you're dead is somewhat difficult. Were this a mandatory system where any death within "X" time of an inoculation had to be reported, with a criminal penalty for not doing so by health providers, we might have a more-full picture. But unlike death certificates which must be issued, and the CDC rules for Covid-19 that say if you were positive any time in the last 28 days, or at death, your death is ruled Covid-related there is no such mandate for VAERS.

Maybe health insurance will pay Emma's bill, at least in part. What's Emma's deductible, if she has insurance? Will she be eating that deductible every year for the rest of her life with a continuing care requirement? Will her insurer refuse to pay entirely, since these were experimental shots? What happens if Emma wants to start a family and tries to get life insurance down the road? Will it be available at any reasonable price? Has her ability to bear a child been damaged or destroyed? What about her ability to enjoy all the things she used to enjoy; will she, for example, still be able to go for a nice jog? Can she hold a driver license? What about a CDL or pilot's license? What about something as simple as driving a forklift in a warehouse? Have the seizures permanently destroyed those options for Emma?

You think Emma hasn't had her employment prospects permanently damaged or even destroyed? Oh, yes, it's illegal to discriminate against someone on the basis of their medical status (funny how people claim that "we can require vaccines!" yet ignore that the law actually makes discrimination in employment or services on the basis of medical status illegal eh?) but you can bet employers do exactly that all the time, every single day. Would you hire Emma knowing that she has a much greater risk of being a serious health insurance cost center? Not if you can get away with turning her down without her knowing you did it due to her health status! Proving that was the reason you were discriminated against is very difficult but every employer in the world can see the GoFraudMe campaign for "help." You think employers don't check that sort of thing on the down low? They sure do. Oops.

Emma's medical chart has been permanently branded by this incident and there is no possible way to erase that branding which is now in the MIB and will be with her forever. It will impact her ability to get a job and it will do lifelong damage to her economically, even if medically it appears she fully recovers, which of course nobody knows at this time.

Emma was stupid. Emma did a stupid thing; she intentionally took 100 times, that is, 10,000%, of the risk she had no choice but to accept from Covid infecting and killing her, and willingly, being 18 years old and thus an adult, pulled a personal black ball out of the bag.

She won a stupid prize for doing a stupid thing, willingly taking 100 times the natural risk.

Who failed to explain to her the above data? Who advocated for her to do said stupid thing? This is not my data it is official government data. Yet official government agencies and their employees have been screaming all over the media, the news, the CDC itself and elsewhere a factual lie; that for someone who is not at particular risk the shots are wildly more-dangerous than natural infection by the very same criteria that the CDC uses to determine whether or not Covid-19 kills you.

Do stupid things, win stupid prizes.

Now Emma knows that her government is and has been full of ****, and she learned it the hard way having been personally butt****ed by the so-called "safe and effective" shots for a disease that was far less-likely to harm her than the shot was.

There are people for whom the math runs the "right way", even given the relatively high risk profile of these shots. But being coerced by an employer, by a school, by peer pressure or by flat-out lies from various "health" organs is not only wrong it damn well ought to result in the most-severe of penalties because we are talking about risks that, if you get a bad dice roll, you can't go back and change your mind.

Don't be Emma.

Do the math before you take the jab.

END

The Left Will Not Let Go of COVID
It’s far too useful for their agenda.

https://spectator.org/covid-masks-left/

Governor Walz here is to announce something tomorrow in regards to loosening restrictions. He has not yet telegraphed what that might be only saying Minnesotans should expect to have a normal summer. Well thank you Governor but shove it I've been living normally without you telling me I can do so. It will be interesting to see how his definition of normal aligns with mine.

Good! This was starting to get ridiculous:

quote:

"Does the Public Health Service Act grant the CDC the legal authority to impose a nationwide eviction moratorium? It does not."

Federal Judge Overturns CDC's Eviction Moratorium

quote:

Originally posted by lastmanstanding:
Governor Walz here is to announce something tomorrow in regards to loosening restrictions. He has not yet telegraphed what that might be only saying Minnesotans should expect to have a normal summer. Well thank you Governor but shove it I've been living normally without you telling me I can do so. It will be interesting to see how his definition of normal aligns with mine.

The rumor that has been leaked is that he will tie various stages to percentages of vaccinated residents. Basically, take the heat for the restrictions off of himself and put them on unvaccinated neighbors who can be shamed and pressured. He's taking a page from Whitmer's playbook.

Chicago launches concert series for fully vaccinated people.

I bet the groups will be lame.


https://wgntv.com/news/chicago...y-vaccinated-people/

Chicago will see the return of cultural events this summer, including a concert series solely for people who are fully vaccinated for COVID-19, officials announced Tuesday.

The Protect Chicago Music Series begins later this month and will require ticketholders to show their COVID-19 vaccination cards and photo identification. Only those who are two weeks past the second vaccine dose or single-dose Johnson & Johnson will be eligible to attend.

“We will never mandate that Chicagoans get a vaccine but this is a creative way to incentivize people to step up and get it, especially younger people,” Chicago Department of Public Health Commissioner Allison Arwady said in a statement. “If we’re to get out of this pandemic, we need people to get vaccinated. It’s safe, it’s effective, it’s free and it’s the best way to protect yourself, your family and your community.”

The news came as Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Tuesday announced the return of several other festivals and cultural events. Already, city officials have said the Chicago Auto Show will return with safety measures including crowd limits.

The cultural events include music festivals, pop-up concerts, dance events and theatre with safety protocols in place. Lightfoot said the city will also promote vaccinations at some events.

2nd. Class. Citizens.

Coming to a country near you.

Biden administration announces support for COVID-19 vaccine patent waivers

The Biden administration has announced support for waiving intellectual property protections for COVID-19 vaccines.

The move was in a response to the “extraordinary circumstances” of the COVID-19 pandemic, US Trade Representative Katherine Tai said in a statement.

“The Administration believes strongly in intellectual property protections, but in service of ending this pandemic, supports the waiver of those protections for COVID-19 vaccines.

“We will actively participate in text-based negotiations at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) needed to make that happen.

“These negotiations will take time given the consensus-based nature of the institution and the complexity of the issues involved.”

The US has come under increasing pressure from countries like India and South Africa to support waivers. Pharmaceutical companies eyeing big profits have lobbied hard to keep them in place.

“The Administration’s aim is to get as many safe and effective vaccines to as many people as fast as possible,” Ms Tai said in her statement.

“As our vaccine supply for the American people is secured, the Administration will continue to ramp up its efforts — working with the private sector and all possible partners — to expand vaccine manufacturing and distribution.

“It will also work to increase the raw materials needed to produce those vaccines.”

The global rollout of the vaccine has been lopsided.

In January more people had been immunised in Israel — with its population of less than 10 million — than in Africa and Latin America combined.

The WTO has for months been facing calls to temporarily remove the intellectual property protections on COVID-19 vaccines.

Proponents say that would help boost production in developing countries that so far have received far fewer jabs.

But that notion has been met with fierce opposition from pharmaceutical giants and their host countries, which insist the patents are not the main roadblocks to scaling up production, and warn the move could hamper innovation.

WTO chief Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said the way the issue was handled was “critical”.

“We need to have a sense of urgency on how we approach this issue of response to COVID-19 because the world is watching,” she said, describing equitable access to the tools to fight the pandemic as the “moral and economic issue of our time”.

*******
The IP legal world are conversing with their Pharma clients ... this will be interesting to watch unfold.

Putting aside profits (well why not, right?), protection of intellectual property (IP), is paramount across many industries. Trade secrets.

And it's been written here before - pharma will eventually get to making pills for ongoing revenue.

At no time there is any humanity.
Greed over common sense.

Dire times for India; prayers for those experiencing these highly emotional times.

--chris

Perhaps I'm interpreting this wrong, but this sounds like a good thing. If these big pharma companies can't profit off of this vaccine, will the huge push to have everyone take it possibly die down a bit? Furthermore, will the idea of having to get a yearly booster shot get swept to the side? I sure hope so. Without the profit incentive, I'm hoping it becomes "just another vaccine," and people will be able to simply choose if they want it or not without the concern of such things as vaccine passports. But maybe I have all that completely backwards.

Not sure if this is the best thread for this, if not sorry. I met with my first case of ‘vaccine bigotry’ or whatever you want to call it. My wife’s’ sister who lives in NY, and has been at the absolute forefront of ‘pandemic bad’ (she has actually not been in Any kind of a store in a year) said after my wife, her sister asked nicely last night “hey, would love to come up and visit now that NY has lifted it’s restrictions. Her response? Sorry, you can’t come visit till you are completely vaccinated. Can’t trust you. Thought that was kind of sucky (nobody in her immediate family has any issues health wise). But, since my wife won’t see this…..Yay. But, I think this kind of crap will get worse…..

Make sure you ask your sister-in-law for proof that she doesn't have AIDS the next time covid and visiting family comes up. See how she responds to that.

One of my sisters in law is a kool aid drinking liberal. Saw her a few weeks back at a funeral. She was so excited to tell me that she got her vaccine. Her and her husband had to drive 3 hours away to get them. She told me she cried when she got the vaccine. Not tears from the pain, mind you, but of relief. I could only chuckle inside.... she has been living the past year in fear, apparently. Unreal.....

Same SIL was going to stop by on Easter for a quick visit. We were in the middle of prepping dinner and told them they’d have to come inside (they planned on visiting on the porch). They decided to skip the visit since they couldn’t be outside.

Most vaccinated nation Seychelles sees Covid spike

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news...id-spike/ar-BB1gnMeP

The Seychelles, which has fully vaccinated over 60% of its population against Covid-19, is bringing back restrictions amid a rise in cases.

The archipelago of nearly 100,000 people recorded close to 500 new cases in the three days to 1 May and has about 1,000 active cases.

A third of the active cases involved people who had had two vaccine doses, the country's news agency said.

The rest had either had a single dose or were unvaccinated.

Schools have been closed and sports activities cancelled for two weeks. Bars, restaurants and shops are to close early and some gatherings have been banned.

"Despite all the exceptional efforts we are making, the Covid-19 situation in our country is critical right now with many daily cases reported last week," Health Minister Peggy Vidot told a press conference on Tuesday.

More than four-fifths of the active cases were among Seychellois people, with the remainder made up of foreigners.

The Seychelles, which relies on tourism for much of its income, began vaccinating its population in January using Chinese-made Sinopharm vaccine doses donated by the United Arab Emirates.

By mid-April about 60% of the vaccine doses administered in the country were Sinopharm, with the rest Indian-made AstraZeneca vaccine doses, Bloomberg reported.

Trials in China and the United Arab Emirates have put Sinopharm vaccine efficacy at 79% and 86% respectively.

The World Health Organization is expected to approve the Sinopharm vaccine and other Chinese-made vaccines for use later this week.

In April, China's top disease control official said the efficacy of the country's Covid vaccines was low, although he later insisted his comments had been misinterpreted.

Researchers in Brazil have put the efficacy of another Chinese-made vaccine, the Sinovac vaccine, at 50.4%.

quote:

They decided to skip the visit since they couldn’t be outside.

quote:

In April, China's top disease control official said the efficacy of the country's Covid vaccines was low, although he later insisted his comments had been misinterpreted.

Researchers in Brazil have put the efficacy of another Chinese-made vaccine, the Sinovac vaccine, at 50.4%.

Apparently the Chinese-made vaccines don't work:

Mainstream media don't want you to know the difference between vaccines that work and vaccines that don't
By Howard Richman

So far two countries have exited the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic using U.S.-made vaccines (Israel and the United States), while two other countries have seen infection rates rising despite heavy use of Chinese-made vaccines (Chile and Seychelles).

Success of U.S. vaccines

Israel achieved herd immunity by vaccinating almost 60% of its population using the U.S.-made Pfizer vaccine. According to a chart published by Worldometer, the COVID death rate has fallen to almost zero in Israel.

Similarly, the United States exited the pandemic the week of March 20, when just 25% had been vaccinated, compared to 45% today. That was the week when deaths in the United States, according to the "Excess Deaths" statistics published by the CDC, stopped exceeding the threshold of what is considered to be a normal number.

Failure of the Chinese Vaccines

CNBC reported that Chile has been experiencing rising cases of COVID-19 despite having one of the world's best vaccination rates. As Thomas Lifson noted in American Thinker, the CNBC article buried the fact that Chile was using a Chinese vaccine.

A similarly deceptive report came out Wednesday on the Bloomberg website, this time about the Seychelles, where 62% of the population is fully vaccinated, yet COVID cases are still rising. The headline of the story indicated that vaccines in general are ineffective, but, as in the Chile story, buried deep inside was the fact that Seychelles was mostly using a Chinese vaccine.

Vaccine Effectiveness

The two primary U.S.-made vaccines (Modern and Pfizer) use the mRNA technology, which is about 95% effective. The European vaccine (AstraZeneca) uses a spike protein technology that is about 70% effective. The Chinese vaccines (Sinovac and Sinopharm) use a killed viral particles technology that appears to be ineffective.

The Moderna and Pfizer vaccines were actually the second and third mRNA vaccines developed in the United States to fight COVID-19. The first was the successful Inovio vaccine, which Dr. Anthony Fauci's NIH buried in seemingly endless clinical trials.

https://www.americanthinker.co...cines_that_dont.html

quote:

Originally posted by MNSIG:

quote:

Originally posted by lastmanstanding:
Governor Walz here is to announce something tomorrow in regards to loosening restrictions. He has not yet telegraphed what that might be only saying Minnesotans should expect to have a normal summer. Well thank you Governor but shove it I've been living normally without you telling me I can do so. It will be interesting to see how his definition of normal aligns with mine.

The rumor that has been leaked is that he will tie various stages to percentages of vaccinated residents. Basically, take the heat for the restrictions off of himself and put them on unvaccinated neighbors who can be shamed and pressured. He's taking a page from Whitmer's playbook.

I suspected something like this. Drive the wedge between the vaccinated and the uncleansed. Now that they have hit the vaccine wall of 40% of the state vaccinated time for the next phase of bringing pressure to bear. Shaming and restricting freedoms of those who resist. What's particularly disgusting is the number of people who are gleefully looking down their nose at their neighbors who do not wish get vaccinated and will have freedoms restricted because of it. These same people will have no problems seeing their uncleansed neighbors hauled off to some quarantine compound. Until they realize the end game of that we are all the same and will be treated as such in the end.

quote:

Originally posted by lastmanstanding: Shaming and restricting freedoms of those who resist. What's particularly disgusting is the number of people who are gleefully looking down their nose at their neighbors who do not wish get vaccinated and will have freedoms restricted because of it.

Absolutely. My wife and I both got the vaccine, but calling people out for their decision is bullshit. I decided it was worth it to me, but I may be proven spectacularly wrong. To dismiss others' concerns has no place in the discussion, IMO.

From ‘childrenshealthdefense.org’ -

Vaccine Makers Claim COVID Shots Are ‘95% Effective’ — But What Does That Mean?

Are Pfizer and Moderna misleading the public about the efficacy of their COVID vaccines by withholding the fact that there’s another way to parse their data — one that has more real-world significance?

In 1954, writer and repentant cigarette industry lobbyist Darrell Huff wrote the best-selling book, “How to Lie with Statistics,” with the aim of teaching the general public how to decode the “secret language of statistics.”

In his introduction, Huff wrote: “Averages and relationships and trends and graphs are not always what they seem.” He added: “There may be more in them than meets the eye, and there may be a good deal less.”

Almost 70 years later, Huff’s admonition that a “well-wrapped statistic” can “sensationalize, inflate, confuse and oversimplify” seems more relevant than ever. For a pertinent modern-day example, one need look no further than COVID vaccine developers’ “headline-worthy” but misleading claims about their products’ “95% effectiveness.” As BMJ associate editor Peter Doshi and others have been confirming for months, these efficacy data are largely a matter of statistical smoke and mirrors.

Why are manufacturers’ claims about vaccine effectiveness misleading? Pfizer and Moderna declined to share with the public the fact that there is another way to parse their data that has more real-world significance.

Examining a statistic called absolute risk reduction — the number of percentage points that an individual’s risk goes down if they do something “protective” — the two companies’ COVID vaccines barely make a dent at all, reducing someone’s risk of experiencing COVID symptoms (the clinical trials’ endpoint) by less than 1%. This is the practical number that people are likely to care about most.

Knowing the paltry real-world impact of the injections on someone’s risk of developing COVID symptoms, how many people swayed by the misleading “95% effective” mantra might instead have decided to refuse the vaccines — products that have revealed themselves to be highly unsafe and, in some cases, fatal?

Unfortunately, topping its November efficacy claims for people 16 years and older, Pfizer just announced its COVID injection is “100% effective for 12-to-15 year-olds.” This announcement sets the stage for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) predicted authorization of Pfizer’s unlicensed vaccine for the adolescent market.

Parents who know that COVID rarely poses a threat to children and adolescents may already be planning to keep their kids away from the experimental shots, but there are other reasons for taking Pfizer’s latest grandiose claims with a grain of salt.

Absolute vs. relative risk

In November — just before the FDA issued its initial Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for Pfizer’s COVID vaccine — Doshi cautioned the public that Pfizer’s and Moderna’s efficacy results seemed dramatic only because the companies derived them from relative risk data.

Absolute risk, simply explained, is “the likelihood that an outcome will occur.” Relative risk “compares the risk of a health event … among one group with the risk among another group.”

Pfizer told the FDA that eight (of approximately 22,000) volunteers in its vaccine group developed a PCR-confirmed case of COVID-19, versus 162 of 22,000 volunteers in the placebo group. Moderna reported a similar spread — five out of 15,000 in the vaccine group versus 90 out of 15,000 in the placebo group.

When one does the math, the Pfizer clinical trial numbers showed: “The risk reduction in absolute terms [was] only 0.7%, from an already very low risk of 0.74% [in the placebo group] to a minimal risk of 0.04% [in the vaccine group].” (Dividing 0.7 — the difference between the two groups — by 0.74 is the mathematical calculation that produced the touted “95% effective” number).

Although the eight versus 162 PCR-confirmed COVID cases in the Pfizer trial may sound like a big difference to the casual reader, Peter Doshi subsequently alerted the public to the fact that Pfizer skewed its analysis by excluding more than 3,400 individuals with non-PCR-confirmed symptoms of COVID — individuals split almost evenly across the vaccine and placebo groups.

As Doshi wrote in The BMJ: “With 20 times more suspected than confirmed cases, this category of disease cannot be ignored simply because there was no positive PCR test result. Indeed this makes it all the more urgent to understand.”

Factoring in both the suspected and confirmed cases, Doshi noted, would drop the 95% relative risk figure down to 19%.

In 2019, the author of a pre-COVID paper, “How to Communicate Evidence to Patients” (quoted in a post-COVID blog), explained that relative risks “can exaggerate the perception of difference” between groups — especially, as in the case of COVID vaccines and many other medical interventions, “when the absolute risks are very small.”

Other researchers agree the concealment of “underlying absolute risks” (and the tendency to “overestimate” effects presented in relative terms) are a “major weakness” of relative risk data. For these reasons, many researchers insist that one risk measure “cannot be interpreted without the other.”

Elaborating on the importance of providing a “complete picture” and communicating both measures, European researchers writing in 2017 explained how relative risk data alone can mislead:

“When relative risks are used for the presentation of effects of a treatment, this can make the treatment seem better than it actually is. For example, investigators may claim that a certain treatment reduces mortality by 50% when the intervention reduces death rates from 0.002% to 0.001%, an improvement the clinical relevance of which may be questioned.”

Risk reduction … or risk intensification?

In the vaccine arena, a subtle byproduct of a narrow focus on relative risk-based efficacy statistics is that the latter often eclipse meaningful discussions of safety.

Pfizer’s announcement of 100% effectiveness in younger adolescents seems intended to accomplish just such a goal, drawing attention away from the 4,178 post-COVID-vaccine deaths now reported (through May 3) to the U.S.-based Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS).

In Europe, the COVID vaccine fallout has been equally alarming: The EudraVigilance database lists 8,430 deaths (through Apr. 24) — and more than 354,000 injuries — following injection with one of the four emergency-authorized shots (made by Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, Janssen/Johnson & Johnson or AstraZeneca).

Supplementing reports to official databases, thousands of individuals have posted COVID vaccine injury stories on social media. Facebook recently deleted a group for COVID-19 vaccine victims and families that had in excess of 120,000 followers — the group “had been gaining more than 10,000 followers per week.” The company’s action is part of an unabashed Big Tech effort to curtail online discussions of vaccine risks and rebrand them as “misinformation.”

Drawing attention to the mounting evidence of COVID vaccine dangers, physicist and medical doctor Richard Fleming, Ph.D., M.D., J.D.. recently described increased risks for inflammation and blood clotting as well as a worrisome type of protein clumping associated with dementia and other neurological disorders.

Fleming called on the Biden administration to immediately reevaluate “whether there’s any demonstrated efficacy” of the COVID shots. In Fleming’s view, the companies’ own data show that the injections have “no statistically significant benefit” and “make zero difference in stopping COVID.”

Talking back

In the concluding chapter of “How to Lie with Statistics”, Huff encouraged members of the public to be more discerning and to “talk back” to and “face down” phony statistics. To this end, he recommended asking five simple questions, all of which could be helpful as the public scrutinizes the vaccine industry’s blanket pronouncements about COVID vaccine efficacy and safety and regulators’ moving-target statements about herd immunity:

1. “Who says so?” This question entails assessing phenomena like researcher bias, use of ambiguous statements, “selection of favorable data and suppression of unfavorable” and reliance on improper measures.

2. “How does he know?” Evaluating this question includes considering biased or improper sampling, small sample sizes and low response rates, including researcher attempts to cover up these defects.

3. “What’s missing?” Do the researchers rely on meaningless averages or fail to contextualize their findings?

4. “Did somebody change the subject?” Huff noted that “one thing is all too often reported as another.”

5. “Does it make sense?” With this final question, Huff cautioned that many a flawed statistic — particularly in the medical realm — “gets by only because the magic of numbers brings about a suspension of common sense.”

As Children’s Health Defense Chairman Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. noted in January, “the absence of a placebo group in post-vaccination surveillance systems makes it easy for self-interested pharmaceutical and regulatory officials to undercount injuries by attributing them to coincidence.” Kennedy added, “Coincidence is turning out to be quite lethal to COVID vaccine recipients.”

The BMJ’s Doshi has shown that vaccine manufacturers are not above inappropriately excluding data, deviating from study protocols (and then hiding the deviations), using unofficially unblinded study groups and keeping raw data (even when taxpayer-funded) to themselves.

One way for the public to push back against this “strategic chicanery” and lethal “coincidences” is to follow the lead of rigorous questioners like Doshi, querying the “trustworthiness and meaningfulness” of reported results at every step.

END