All Quiet On the Western Front
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All Quiet On the Western Front
We asked Gordana Schifanelli for sources. We heard crickets.
Gordana Schifanelli has not responded to my request for references for her comments as noted in my last The Duckpin post. You can read that here: https://www.facebook.com/107009264299987/posts/482886653378911/
In fact, she is doubling down on false insinuations regarding vaccines. In a recent tweet, she says: “If vaccines work why more ppl died from COVID-19 in 2021 with more than 70% people vaccinated?”
Let’s set the record straight.
Yes there were more cases and deaths in 2021 than in 2020. But let’s examine what happened.
1. New variants – Delta was more deadly than wildtype.
2. Omicron was more transmissible.
3. We finally understood that the virus was airborne.
4. Only 65% of the US population is immunized thereby giving the virus plenty of bodies to infect.
5. More time in 2021 as opposed to 2020 to build up the wider spread of the virus and therefore increasing the number of deceased.
6. The roll out of vaccines started in 2021, with only certain age or risk groups able to get vaccinated early in the year. Therefore we did not even approach that 65% rate until toward the end of 2021.
But the vaccines are working as we saw in the clinical trials. I’m providing several citations to prove my point.
Summary points from https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#rates-by-vaccine-status
Rates of COVID-19 Cases and Deaths by Vaccination Status
1. People who were unvaccinated had a greater risk of testing positive for Covid-19 and a greater risk of dying from Covid-19 than people who were vaccinated with a primary series.
2. Unvaccinated people in all age groups had higher case and death rates than people vaccinated with a primary series in the same age groups.
3. Case and death rates for people vaccinated with a primary series of any vaccine type were lower than for unvaccinated people.
4. People who were vaccinated with a primary series and an additional or booster dose had lower case rates overall compared with those without an additional or booster dose. Both of these groups had low risk of testing positive for Covid and a lower risk of dying from Covid compared with people who were unvaccinated.
Cases by Vaccination Status and Booster Dose:
Rates of Covid Deaths by Vaccination Status and Booster Dose:
I next urge you to read this article and play around with the pie charts (Australian data). The denominator is important. Schifanelli simply hasn’t done her homework.
“Social media accounts of people who routinely share anti-vaccine misinformation, including some politicians, have taken this information out of context to present a false narrative that vaccines are ineffective.” Ring a bell????
It’s called “per population rates”.
Another graphic from:
I also found Montgomery County Rate of Cases, Hospitalizations and Deaths by Vaccination Status. I believe that we can generalize this information to the entire population of Maryland. https://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/covid19/data/case-counts.html#cases-by-vaccination-status
Another source, the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (January 28, 2022) . https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7104e2.htm#T1_down
Medical studies further verify the effectiveness of the Covid vaccines, preventing disease, severe disease and death. I provide the links to several good references:
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2115624
“Our study shows that participants who received a booster at least 5 months after a second dose of BNT162b2 had 90% lower mortality due to Covid-19 in the short term than participants who did not receive a booster.”.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8552534/
“In summary, we found that the BNT162b2 and ChAdOx1 Covid vaccines offered substantial protection against death from Covid caused by the delta variant.
This next citation from Washington State Department of Health is, I believe, reflective of other states. It’s amazingly comprehensive and I urge you to read this as well.
https://doh.wa.gov/sites/default/files/2022-02/421-010-CasesInNotFullyVaccinated.pdf
Finally, “Vaccinations Against Covid May Have Averted Up to 140,000 Deaths in the US. . . As of May 9, 2021, reductions in COVID-19 deaths associated with vaccines had translated to a value of statistical life benefit ranging between $625 billion and $1.4 trillion.”
I had hoped that Schifanellia would have gone back and done some research. Both Cox and Schifanelli are prone to taking a headline or a talking point and trying to gain mileage from it. It does not work that way in medical science. I will continue to call someone out for spreading misinformation. (To respond to one of Schifanelli’s supporters, FYI, I did not call her a liar.) It is inappropriate for any politician to be advising in medical science. Let the science speak for itself and let the medical people speak to the science.
So, to answer Schifanelli, the vast majority of cases, hospitalizations and deaths among the unvaccinated are responsible for the increase in 2021. The vaccine is effective and is far safer than suffering from Covid.
I want to see my Governor and Lt. Governor know how to ask for help from reliable medical experts in order to understand the medical literature. I want my Governor and Lt. Governor to not speak to talking points when it comes to my health and safety. I want the truth – from medical experts, not candidates trying to win an election! But perhaps Cox and Schifanelli can’t handle the truth! –because it does not fit their narrative?
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