CDC Tracking BA.2.87.1, New Omicron Subvariant With Potential to Evade Immunity

Experts detected a strain of SARS-CoV-2 with more than 30 changes in its spike protein compared with Omicron subvariant XBB.1.5, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced. The newer Omicron subvariant, known as BA.2.87.1, has infected at least 9 people in South Africa since September 2023. No cases have been reported in the US or outside South Africa, the CDC noted in its update.

The large number of changes in spike proteins raises the possibility that the new strain could escape the immunity people have acquired from vaccines or infection. Still, the relatively few cases suggest the variant is not highly transmissible right now.

Although the CDC is carefully monitoring the new strain, the agency expects that current vaccines and treatments will continue to be effective.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2815864

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Scientist claims ‘smoking gun’ evidence COVID-19 intentionally created by researchers in Chinese lab

COVID-19 may have been created in a Chinese lab, a British professor told the UN Wednesday, with another expert claiming that evidence of the likelihood has reached “the level of a smoking gun.”

Richard H. Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers University, was quoted saying in a new Wall Street Journal article that the virus that killed millions around the world may actually have been manmade in China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology.

He cited evidence found in a 2018 document from the lab that talked of making such a virus.

“[The document] elevates the evidence provided by the genome sequence from the level of noteworthy to the level of a smoking gun,” Ebright said in the piece by former New York Times editor Nicholas Wade.

The papers from the lab cited by Ebright contained drafts and notes regarding a grant proposal called Project DEFUSE, which sought to test engineering bat coronaviruses in a way that would make them more easily transmissible to humans.

The proposal was ultimately rejected and denied funding by the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, but Wade suggested that their work could have been carried out by researchers in Wuhan who had secured Chinese government funding.

“Viruses made according to the DEFUSE protocol could have been available by the time Covid-19 broke out, sometime between August and November 2019,” wrote Wade, a former science editor of the New York Times.

“This would account for the otherwise unexplained timing of the pandemic along with its place of origin.”

Along with the research notes, Wade claimed the specific genetic structure of the coronavirus that allowed it to infect humans served as another strong indication of “the virus’s laboratory birth.”

“Whereas most viruses require repeated tries to switch from an animal host to people, SARS-CoV-2 infected humans out of the box, as if it had been preadapted while growing in the humanized mice called for in the DEFUSE protocol,” Wade wrote.

While scientists continue to debate whether the coronavirus pandemic was a natural occurrence or manmade, Ebright believed there was credibility that the work proposed by the now-controversial EcoHealth Alliance led to the development COVID-19.

Following the release of the 2018 documents — which were published by US Right to Know through a Freedom of Information Act request — Ebright said there was clearer evidence that the virus was manufactured in a lab, the Daily Telegraph reported.

The 2018 documents contained drafts and notes regarding Project DEFUSE and how to synthesize bat coronaviruses to make them more transmissible.

The researchers proposed introducing “appropriate human-specific cleavage sites” to the spike proteins of SARS-related viruses in the lab, the same method several biologists have said could have been used to synthesize the coronavirus that led to the pandemic.

According to the documents, the researchers had planned to conduct a portion of the research at the Wuhan lab where they noted that safety conditions were not up to US standards, to the point where they claimed American scientists would “likely freak out.”

While COVID-19’s origins remain a mystery, Dr. Filippa Lentzos, an associate professor of science and international security at King’s College London, said the world needed to acknowledge that the possibility exists that the virus was synthesized.

Speaking before the UN in New York on Wednesday, Lentzos presented the work of the Independent Task Force on Research with Pandemic Risks, which calls on scientists the world over to follow stricter regulations lest another worldwide breakout occur, the Telegraph reports.

“We have to acknowledge the fact that the pandemic could have started from some research-related incident,” Lentzos said.

“Are we going to find that out? In my view, I think it’s very unlikely that we will. We need to do better in the future,” she added. “We are going to see more ambiguous events.”

https://nypost.com/2024/02/29/world-news/scientists-may-have-started-the-covid-pandemic-article/

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Angry nurses rally at Gold Coast University Hospital, demand jobs back

A vindictive bureaucracy at work. They don't like admitting that they were wrong

Dozens of placard-waving nurses and other healthcare workers took part in the rally outside Gold Coast University Hospital on Saturday.

It followed fury this week after The Courier-Mail revealed leaked Queensland Health emails telling a veteran nurse that “we are unable to re-employ any staff who were officially terminated” for refusing the jab.

Queensland Health boss Michael Walsh said the edict was incorrect and wrote to all hospital and health services in the state on Friday telling them there was no directive not to reinstate sacked workers.

Health Minister Shannon Fentiman this week repeatedly denied there were any barriers to hundreds of workers who refused to comply with the vaccination mandate from returning to work.

But nurses protesting on the Gold Coast said they were still struggling to get their jobs back.

They included 23-year veteran intensive care nurse Michelle Williams, who said she tried to reapply at the major hospital she was sacked from in 2021 but was told there were no vacancies - only to see a job ad for a position.

“It’s frustrating, it’s really frustrating,” she said. “Patients are suffering and they’ve got very junior staff looking after them. “There’s so many of us with so much experience and our experience is just going to waste.”

Ms Williams said Ms Fentiman needed to “stop lying to us”.

“We want to come back to work, we’ve done nothing wrong except not follow this one (vaccine) direction,” she said. “We’re not criminals. We’re people who love our jobs, we love looking after patients and we just want to help people. “We just want to come back to work and do what we love doing, and that’s helping people get better.”

Ella Leach, secretary of the Nurses Professional Association of Queensland, said Ms Fentiman had not responded to an invitation to attend or at least endorse the rally.

Ms Leach said the minister had been sent the names and experience of 350 sacked health care workers who wanted to return and “Shannon should be reaching out to them directly” instead of making them reapply.

“There’s just zero excuse … we want her to take some actual action,” she said.

“These people were born to be nurses and health professionals - they want to work. It doesn’t make them happy hearing that the system’s crumbling, it makes them desperately angry and upset. “All they want to do is work.”

Ms Leach was herself sacked from Queensland Children’s Hospital for refusing the vaccine - in January this year, four months after the mandate was lifted, and despite being seven months’ pregnant. She launched unfair dismissal action against Queensland Health.

Ms Leach said many sacked healthcare workers who had reapplied for jobs with Queensland Health were still being rejected because of their “disciplinary action history” in refusing the vaccine.

“These people have decades of experience and they are desperately needed,” she said.

Ms Leach said 6000 nurses were predicted to retire in 2024 but Queensland Health was hiring nurses from interstate or overseas, with incentives of up to $70,000.

https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/angry-nurses-rally-at-gold-coast-university-hospital-demand-jobs-back/news-story/37d0412f8b3f3371999b35dc15483c12

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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Top Cardiologist Reports 47-Fold Increase in Serious Myocarditis Post Covid Vaccinations

Dr. Dean Patterson, a leading consultant cardiologist in Guernsey and Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, has written to the U.K. medical professional regulator the General Medical Council (GMC) calling for an investigation into harms from the COVID-19 vaccines, in a letter first published on Dr. Aseem Malhotra’s website.

February 19th 2024
Charlie Massey
Chair of Executive Board
The General Medical Council

Dear Mr. Massey,

I am writing to express my enthusiastic support for Dr. Aseem Malhotra, a distinguished medical professional who, through his dedication to improving public health and promoting evidence-based medicines, has inspired numerous medical professionals to speak out in support of non-pharmaceutical management of chronic illness. He has been attacked for his stance in the past, in respect to his views on sugar and statins. He today again stands accused of spreading dangerous misinformation by a group of medical professionals who appear dedicated to reducing science and medical practice to an echo chamber.

It is indeed a sad irony that Dr. Malhotra has been labeled an anti-vaxxer conspiracy theorist, as he himself took the initial COVID-19 vaccine, recommended it to others and even his father. He later realised that serious safety signals were being reported and understandably has concerns that the COVID-19 vaccine may have contributed to accelerated fatal acute myocardial infarction in his father.

Over the past 18 years, I have been a partner, consultant cardiologist and general physician at the Medical Specialist Group and Princess Elizabeth Hospital in Guernsey with a population of 63,000. Here I am proud to say, we provide a consultant-only service which leads to exceptional continuity of care compared to the NHS where multiple tiers of doctors working shifts care for patients.

In my personal experience, the COVID-19 vaccine has caused me intolerable concern for patient safety here in Guernsey. In my 33 years of medical practice, I have never witnessed such harm from a therapeutic intervention. I lost a female patient due to myocarditis aged 42 in 2021. A 63-year-fit woman died from myocarditis one month after her booster vaccine in 2022 after getting breathless within one week of the injection. In addition, I personally cared for a 20-year-old male with severe myocarditis which developed within 24 hours of his second Pfizer vaccine. In the first year of the rollout, I diagnosed 20 patients with myocarditis and 15 cases of pericarditis, including one death (42 year-old) and another who required an ICD (79-year-old male). In the 16 years prior to this, I would on average diagnose two to three myocarditis cases per year, with serious cases being limited to one every three to four years. The U.K. ONS data for England and Wales show 250 hospital admissions for myocarditis over 10 years. This equates to two per 10 years for Guernsey. In the first year of the rollout, we had 10 hospital admissions for myocarditis. In the second year of vaccine rollout, I have seen another 18 myocarditis cases, including the death of the 63-year-old woman listed above.

In addition, I have noticed an increase in the number of heart failure and acute myocardial infarction cases. I am currently auditing the ambulatory ECG data as I believe there has been an increase in arrhythmia burden. Incredibly, the side-effects don’t stop there, as we have seen a doubling of the stroke numbers recently with an increase in overall thrombo-embolic disease since the rollout of the COVID-19 vaccines.

I am therefore writing not only in support of Dr. Malhotra’s views on this matter but also to inform you that the medical establishment appears blind to the harm. I am extremely concerned that medical practice itself will be irreparably damaged by the fallout from the mishandling of the Covid vaccine side effects. Dr. Malhotra must be supported in his efforts to shine a light on this.

While the GMC is mandated to protect patients and regulate doctors, currently the GMC finds itself in a regulatory vacuum where it, like many mainstream doctors, is unable to openly support what should be an urgent independent investigation into Covid vaccine safety.

It is my opinion that the side-effects being detected are the tip of the iceberg. Healthcare professionals are quite poor at reporting Yellow Card cases, while the NHS doctors are overburdened and unlikely to spend 30-45 minutes submitting a Yellow Card incident. This is particularly the case when the same doctors have been indoctrinated with the statement that the Covid vaccines are safe and effective, while the evidence for this safety and effectiveness from double blind placebo controlled studies is extremely weak.

The initial Covid studies were due to complete in Q4 2023 and we await the final report, notwithstanding the major flaw that most of the placebo group have been vaccinated in 2021. A paper published very recently (K. Faksova, et al., ‘COVID-19 vaccines and adverse events of special interest: A multinational Global Vaccine Data Network cohort study of 99 million vaccinated individuals‘, Vaccine, 2024) shows significant side-effects based upon this known under reporting.

Cardiologists in the main continue to blame COVID-19 infection as the cause for the harms I am seeing. However I have not diagnosed a single case of post-COVID-19 myocarditis prior to the vaccine rollout in Guernsey. The U.K. Government website from 2021 to date states that Covid causes myocarditis. The evidence it lists for this is flawed. One study it uses as evidence by Buckley et al. (‘Prevalence and clinical outcomes of myocarditis and pericarditis in 718,365 COVID-19 patients‘, Eur J Clin Invest. 2021) concluded that myocarditis had a prevalence of 5% in Covid patients. This study used data from the USA EMR records, which is poisoned by the flow of money. It is well documented that hospitals in the USA were paid $37,000 if a patient with Covid was admitted to ICU. ICU admissions would be promoted in patients with ‘multi-system involvement’. A rise in troponin, however insignificant, would be the rationale for diagnosing myocarditis and the accompanying $37,000 payment when the patient was admitted to ICU.

It is well known within the cardiologist circle pre-Covid that patients with sepsis often have a rise in troponin and the rise is proportional to age and co-morbidities and not indicative of myocarditis or a heart attack. In 2020, Guernsey had 20,000 Covid cases, which according to the paper by Buckley et al. would lead to 1,000 cases of myocarditis, but I have not diagnosed a single case of myocarditis prior to the vaccine rollout.

Dr. Melissa Heightman, a UCL Long Covid expert, is on record when speaking at the Acute and General medicine conference in 2022, stated that after MDT with cardiologists about the late gadolinium being seen on CMRI scans, they concluded it was just the usual background noise.

In the paper by Buckley et al. above they reference a paper by Puntmann et al. (‘Outcomes of Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance Imaging in Patients Recently Recovered From Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)’, JAMA Cardiol. 2020) which erroneously concluded that 78 of 100 subjects recovered from mild Covid without cardiac symptoms had myocardial involvement on their cardiac MRI scans.

The correct interpretation is that the abnormalities seen were due to the same background noise referred to by Dr. Heightman, amplified further by the study done in Germany using 3 Tesla MRI scanners.

In the U.K. we use in the main 1.5 Tesla MRI scanners. More power equals more noise!

It is my opinion that the GMC must not only support whistleblowers like Dr. Malhotra, but urgently put in place the following:

* A working group to investigate the COVID-19 vaccine safety. May I suggest you speak with Dr. Yvonne Young from the UKHSA and Dr. Melissa Heighten (UCL) to invite their views on this matter? I am part of a growing group of doctors who would like to be part of this investigation, as I am sure Dr. Malhotra would be.

* A helpline to support doctors afraid of speaking out.

* A helpline to support those who are vaccine injured. Clearly the GMC should seek support from the MHRA and U.K. Government with funding for this work.

* A panel should be established to open discussion and reporting the above strategy in the media, in a calm unbiased manner to avoid undue stress on the general population and the healthcare system.

In conclusion, I wholeheartedly endorse Dr. Aseem Malhotra and believe that his unwavering commitment to advancing a more patient-centric, evidence-based approach to healthcare makes him a valuable asset to the medical community. I am confident that his contributions in relation to exposing the truth about the COVID-19 vaccine safety will continue to have a lasting impact on the health and wellbeing of countless individuals. There are many doctors and healthcare professionals who will openly endorse my view, but sadly there are a silent majority who will only endorse my view quietly in private conversation.

Unfortunately, medicine finds itself standing at crossroads. There are significant seeds of division. The question for you is therefore: are you going to heal these wounds or empower the irreversible split of healthcare that beckons in an increasingly uncertain future?

Sincerely,

Dr. Dean Patterson MBCHB, FRCP

Pathologist Dr. Clare Craig writes on X that, assuming Dr. Patterson saw all the cases on the island, “that would equate to 35,000 myo- and pericarditis cases in U.K. and 200,000 in USA”.

https://dailysceptic.org/2024/02/27/top-cardiologist-reports-47-fold-increase-in-serious-myocarditis-post-covid-vaccinations-as-he-calls-on-gmc-to-investigate/

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Australia: Queensland Supreme Court finds some Covid vaccine orders unlawful

They were the three words of the week, if not of the year: ‘vaccine’, ‘mandates’ and ‘unlawful’. That was the key takeout from the decision handed down this week by the Queensland Supreme Court in a case largely financed by mining gazillionaire and political agitator Clive Palmer. Specifically, the Covid-19 vaccine mandates, implemented in the form of directions given to Queensland police and ambulance service workers, were made unlawfully, the court has ruled, partly because they didn’t take into account those workers’ ‘human rights’.

The news, of course, is to be welcomed. It is the first crack in the dam wall and will hopefully be followed by significant class actions and further court cases. Ideally, one might hope that certain senior politicians, senior bureaucrats, doctors and corporate heads will wind up in prison for their collective roles in the grotesque Covid abuse of power, following a royal commission. However, there is the chance that the Queensland case will be overturned on appeal, as the powers-that-be attempt to reassert their censorship and crushing authoritarianism over what remains the most disgraceful period in our history.

Alone – and we really do mean alone – among the Australian mainstream media, indeed in many instances the world media, The Spectator Australia fought from the very beginning against the vaccine mandates, the lockdowns, the mask mandates, the school closures, the banning of perfectly good (and cheap) alternative treatments for Covid and the fraudulent claims being made about the safety of the mRNA ‘vaccines’. Dismissed as conspiracy theorists, extreme right-wingers, anti-vaxxers and a whole list of other pejoratives, this magazine and its astonishing collection of writers can hold their heads high – Rebecca Weisser, Ramesh Thakur, Julie Sladden, Kara Thomas, Alexandra Marshall, David Flint, David Adler, James Allan, Rocco Loiacono, Robert Clancy, Rowan Dean and many others. Of course, there were a miserable handful of writers, and readers, who were appalled by our Covid scepticism and took their writing skills or subscriptions to other media outlets more in tune with their views. They are not missed.

On 22 May 2021, as powerful voices and commentators within the Australian media frantically urged the government to introduce vaccine mandates and vaccine passports, we wrote on this page:

So we will be blunt on this particular occasion: if Prime Minister Scott Morrison, Health Minister Greg Hunt or any members of the federal or ‘national’ cabinets seek to impose a ‘vaccine passport’ that restricts the freedom of movement and liberties of Australians, they will potentially be guilty of human rights abuses and even crimes against humanity.

Any number of conventions and laws exist that make it a criminal offence for a government or its bureaucrats to coerce or make mandatory any form of medical treatment against the will of the individual. Such laws and conventions were brought in as a direct result of the atrocities of the second world war and the revolting medical experiments conducted by not only the Nazis but other totalitarian regimes against their own people.

Make no mistake; a ‘vaccine passport’ denying liberties and restricting the free movement of Australians within their own country will be the most sinister and disgraceful act by an Australian government against its own people in our history. This is for one simple reason: governments and bureaucracies have no right to enforce or to coerce an individual to take a medical treatment or drug against the individual’s better instincts or judgment.

In any free society, the government’s role is to persuade, not to coerce or to mandate.

It is a fine line between encouraging or incentivising vaccination and coercing it, but telling traumatised Australians that they can, for example, only visit their loved ones or carry on their normal business if they inject a certain drug is completely unacceptable and indeed reprehensible. Persuasion is all very well. Coercion and emotional or financial blackmail are not.

Then on 3 July 2021, we wrote:

"It is on the coronavirus that an absence of any genuine political convictions on the part of the PM and his advisers is most apparent. Devoid of a bedrock of political philosophy to stand upon, the government makes it up as it goes along, reacting, presumably, to internal polling as much as to media hysteria. It is not a pretty sight"

Kudos to Queensland Judge Glenn Martin for having the courage and moral fortitude to put into law what was always self-evident to any self-respecting conservative. The vaccine mandates trashed every ethical, moral, medical and human rights principle in a free democracy.

https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/03/mandatory-vindication/

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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The Excess Death Disappearing Act

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) in the United Kingdom has unfurled a new methodology for calculating excess deaths.

At the helm of this change is Julie Stanborough, ONS’s deputy director for Data and Analysis for Social Care and Health, and a seasoned veteran in the realm of government statistics. She spun her numerical narratives previously for the Cabinet Office during the COVID-19 crisis, and before that, in the labyrinthine corridors of HM Revenue and Customs and the Department for Work and Pensions.

Ms. Stanborough has promised a regime of continuous refinement for these newly minted estimates of excess deaths, now intriguingly tagged as “Official Statistics in Development.”

She said, “In the spirit of continuous improvement, we will regularly review estimates of excess deaths produced by the new methodology, with further refinements being undertaken if necessary. As such, the new estimates will be labelled as Official Statistics in Development while further review, testing, and development work is undertaken.”

In place of the old method, Ms. Stanborough has ushered in a statistical model that she explains will rely on age-specific mortality rates.

The ONS is now posing the question—how many deaths would we expect there to be within the context of an evolving population?

The introduction of the new calculation method, has been dissected with clinical precision by health campaigner John Campbell, revealing startling disparities between the old and new figures, with the latter method significantly reducing the count of excess deaths.

David Dickson, a forensic investigator, has unveiled an even more shocking revelation, accusing the ONS of erasing some 68,000 excess deaths from the 2023 records through this statistical manoeuvre.

This open-ended commitment to iterative adjustment begs the question: What necessitated this methodological metamorphosis in the first place?

The recalibration of numbers has cast the pandemic’s mortality in a starkly different light, artificially amplifying the lethality of the pandemic year in comparison to the previous counts of excess mortality.

The complexity of the new model equation is seemingly decipherable only by someone such as Rainman, raising suspicions about the motivations behind such opaque adjustments.

Ms. Stanborough has said, “It’s important to note that excess deaths estimates are just that—estimates. They cannot be counted on an individual basis, as can be done for death registrations. They are estimated using statistical techniques and, as a result, there is no single ‘true’ measure of excess deaths.”

Thus, while statistical manipulations may have obscured relative increases in mortality, the immutable facts of absolute death counts remain more resistant to concealment.

Dr. Thomas Binder has pointed out that a similar strategy of adjusting excess mortality expectations was previously employed by StatSchweiz in Switzerland, particularly affecting younger demographics.

Lifting the Shroud

Amidst this backdrop of statistical shuffling, a rigorous investigation by Denis Rancourt, Maurine Baudin, Joseph Hickey, and Jérémie Mercier has pierced through the fog with their illuminating study on COVID-19 vaccine-associated mortality across the southern hemisphere.

Their empirical scrutiny of the vaccination campaigns across 17 countries has revealed a damning narrative: the mass vaccination efforts have failed to demonstrably impact all-cause mortality rates, contradicting the prevailing vaccine discourse.

The study has meticulously correlated the timing of mortality spikes with the aggressive rollout of vaccine boosters, challenging the purported benefits of COVID-19 vaccinations.

Far from reducing mortality, the data suggested a sinister association between vaccination campaigns and subsequent increases in death rates.

This revelation has cast a long shadow over the global push for COVID-19 vaccinations, demanding a sober reassessment of their safety and efficacy.

Mr. Rancourt and his team’s findings not only have questioned the utility of these vaccines in curtailing the virus but also have shone the spotlight on the critical need for a more discerning and empirical approach to public health policy.

As the narrative around excess deaths and COVID-19 vaccines has continued to evolve, the ONS’s new methodology for calculating excess deaths has added another layer of complexity to an already convoluted debate.

With politicians like UK MP Andrew Bridgen advocating for inquiries into excess mortality, the ONS’s adjustments now threaten to obscure these crucial investigations, potentially eroding public trust in governmental transparency.

This latest episode in the annals of public health statistics serves as a poignant reminder of the adage, “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”

In the end, the quest for truth in the age of COVID-19 has become ever more entangled in the webs of statistical reinterpretation, leaving the public yearning for clarity amidst a sea of numbers.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/opinion/the-excess-death-disappearing-act-5595747

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CDC Reveals ‘Changing Threat’ of COVID-19

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced on Feb. 23 that hospitalizations and deaths from COVID-19 are overall on the decline in recent years despite some episodic episodes of elevated transmission.

“Severe outcomes from COVID-19 have substantially decreased since 2020 and 2021,” the agency said. Hospital admissions in the United States for COVID-19 have dropped by more than 60 percent from the peak in 2021, and have also decreased to just 900,000 hospitalizations in 2023—from 2.5 million in 2021.
“The decline in deaths associated with COVID-19 is even more dramatic than the drop in hospitalizations. In 2021, over 450,000 deaths among Americans were associated with COVID-19, while in 2023, that number fell to roughly 75,000,” it said.

The federal agency further noted that COVID-19 infections have stayed at a level similar to previous years, but the chance of being hospitalized has dropped.

“While other factors are involved, the increase in the percent of the population with COVID-19 antibodies indicates that rising population immunity is partially responsible for the decline in severity,” the agency said. “In January 2021, only 21 percent of people aged 16 years and older had COVID-19 antibodies.”

At the same time, the CDC said that hospitalization rates have dropped across all age groups. But it stressed that certain older adults, infants, pre-existing medical conditions still appear to have a higher risk of developing a severe case of COVID-19, adding that adults aged 65 and older accounted for 63 percent of hospitalizations and 88 percent of in-hospital deaths from the virus for the first half of 2023.

More than 90 percent of that group had “multiple pre-existing medical conditions,” and it also noted that infants aged six months and younger have higher rates of COVID-19 hospitalizations, the CDC said.

Despite the positive update, the CDC warned that the virus is a “public health threat” and again recommended everyone, including infants and pregnant women, to take one of the updated booster vaccines. It once again suggested that people wear masks and improve ventilation in closed areas.

On Feb. 16, the CDC said that the 2023–24 respiratory illness season appears to have peaked but stressed it is “far from over.” It noted that hospitalizations for COVID-19, influenza, and RSV have dropped in recent weeks.

“However, respiratory disease activity remains elevated, and some flu activity indicators have increased again,” according to the agency’s update. “Test positivity for flu rose nationally in late January and has leveled off since but continues to increase in parts of the country. Emergency department visits for flu have been going up in some areas of the county.”
Notably, the combined peak for hospitalizations associated with the three viruses “was not as high” as the previous season, adding that there were also “fewer reports of healthcare strain” for 2023 and 2024. Overall hospitalizations and deaths for the flu and COVID-19 were lower, too, it added.

Major COVID Study

This month, researchers from the Global Vaccine Data Network—an arm of the World Health Organization—looked at about a dozen medical conditions considered adverse events of special interest in a population study of 99 million people who were vaccinated.
“The size of the population in this study increased the possibility of identifying rare potential vaccine safety signals,” lead author Kristýna Faksová of the Department of Epidemiology Research, Statens Serum Institut in Denmark, said in a news release. “Single sites or regions are unlikely to have a large enough population to detect very rare signals,” she added.

Cases of a type of heart inflammation known as myocarditis were found in first, second, and third doses of the Pfizer mRNA shot, while the rate was higher in Moderna’s second shot, according to the research.

Pericarditis, which is inflammation of the pericardium, saw a 6.9-times higher risk in people who took AstraZeneca’s vaccine, while there was a 1.7-fold to 2.6-fold chance of developing the condition after taking Moderna’s first and fourth dose, respective, it found.

“This unparalleled scenario underscores the pressing need for comprehensive vaccine safety monitoring, as very rare adverse events associated with COVID-19 vaccines may only come to light after administration to millions of individuals,” the authors wrote.

They also found an increase in Guillain-Barré syndrome for those who received the AstraZeneca shot within a few weeks, and higher-than-anticipated cases of disseminated encephalomyelitis, a form of inflammation of the brain and spinal cord, among people who got the Moderna first vaccine dose.

“Moreover, overall risk–benefit evaluations of vaccination should take the risk associated with infection into account, as multiple studies demonstrated higher risk of developing the events under study, such as GBS, myocarditis, or ADEM, following SARS-CoV-2 infection than vaccination,” the authors concluded.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/health/cdc-reveals-changing-threat-of-covid-19-post-5596131?ea_src=ai_recommender&ea_med=desktop_health

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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Study Finds Hearing and Balance Disorders Among COVID-19 Vaccinated

More cases of hearing and balance disorders have been observed after people received COVID-19 vaccines, according to a recent study, which asked vaccinated people to remain alert to such complications.

The Australian peer-reviewed study, published in the Vaccine journal on Feb. 22, aimed to determine whether there was an increase in “audiovestibular events” following COVID-19 vaccination in south-eastern Australia. Audiovestibular refers to conditions related to hearing and balance disorders.

“Healthcare providers and vaccinees should be alert to potential audiovestibular complaints after COVID-19 vaccination,” the authors said.

Increase in Incidences of Vertigo, Tinnitus

Researchers found a rise in vertigo and tinnitus cases after vaccination. Tinnitus is a condition that makes an individual hear sounds like humming, ringing, or rushing, in the absence of external stimuli. Vertigo makes people feel like they’re spinning, and can result in dizziness.

“Our study found an increased relative incidence of vertigo in the 42 days following mRNA vaccines, and an increased relative incidence of tinnitus in the 42 days following both Vaxzevria adenovirus vector and mRNA vaccines,” researchers wrote.

“We are the first to confirm this increased relative incidence of tinnitus and vertigo post COVID-19 vaccines,“ they stated. They speculated that the audiovestibular events may be an ”immune mediated injury” triggered by the COVID-19 vaccines.

No Rise in Cases of Hearing Loss

In the same study, the researchers reported that there was “no increased relative incidence in hearing loss” in the 42 days following any COVID-19 vaccine.

They noted that the U.S. Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) data and studies conducted on the Finnish and Danish health care registry have found “found no association between sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSNHL) and COVID-19 vaccination.”

As such, the authors concluded that their analysis “supports the opinion that there is no increased incidence of hearing loss following COVID-19 vaccines.”

The authors pointed out a limitation—that their study could not account for any concurrent COVID-19 infections, which other studies have suggested could be associated with audiovestibular events.

“COVID-19 infection is an important potential confounder of the association between COVID-19 vaccination and audiovestibular events,” they wrote.

Researchers collected vaccine-related data from two databases in Australia, selecting 45,350 records via SAEFVIC, and 4.94 million records via POLAR, for the time period from January 2021 to March 2023.

SAEFVIC is the central spontaneous reporting service for adverse events following vaccinations in the Australian state of Victoria. The POLAR platform collects and processes general practice data on behalf of Primary Health Networks in Australia. Multiple researchers in the study declared receiving funding from the Department of Health, Victoria. SAEFVIC is funded by the department.

Out of the 45,350 SAEFVIC records, researchers identified 415 cases of vertigo, 226 incidences of tinnitus, and 76 hearing losses. From the POLAR platform, 13,924 reports of vertigo, 4,000 incidences of tinnitus, and 3,214 hearing losses were identified.

Researchers recorded the impact of two types of vaccines—AstraZeneca’s adenovirus vector vaccine and mRNA-based vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna.

The researchers found an increase in vertigo incidence following mRNA vaccines, and an increase in tinnitus incidence following both AstraZeneca and mRNA vaccines.

The reporting rate for audiovestibular events was found to be higher for AstraZeneca shots compared to the mRNA vaccines. In addition, more audiovestibular events were identified after the first dose of AstraZeneca than its second dose, while no such difference was observed for the mRNA vaccines.

Sudden Deafness

SSNHL, commonly known as sudden deafness, refers to an unexplained, rapid loss of hearing either at once or over a few days, caused by damage to the inner ear or the nerve from the ear to the brain. The condition usually affects only a single ear.
Researchers noted that some studies did find an association between Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine and SSNHL, but that the population or the effect size in those studies “was very small.”

One such study was published in February 2022—a cohort study of over 2.6 million patients in Israel. Of the 2,602,557 patients who received the first dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine, 91 cases of SSNHL were reported. Of the 2,441,719 people who received the second dose, 79 SSNHL cases were identified.

While the “effect size is very small,” the researchers of that study said their findings suggest the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine “might be associated with increased risk of SSNHL.”

Tinnitus Takes Toll on Quality of Life

Back in 2021, Gregory Poland, director of the Mayo Clinic’s Vaccine Research Group in Rochester, Minnesota, developed tinnitus after receiving his second shot of the COVID-19 vaccine. While he experienced ringing in both ears, the situation was worse in the left ear.

“It was like someone suddenly blew a dog whistle in my ear … It has been pretty much unrelenting,” he said in an interview with MedPage Today in March 2022. The outlet did not specify which vaccine he received, however it noted that, “Given his personal situation, [Mr. Poland] will look to protein subunit vaccines that are in development but not yet authorized by the [Food and Drug Administration], such as those from Novavax, Medicago, and Sanofi.”

At the time, Mr. Poland said there could be tens of thousands of people affected in the United States and potentially millions globally.

“What has been heartbreaking about this, as a seasoned physician, are the emails I get from people that, this has affected their life so badly, they have told me they are going to take their own life,” he told the outlet.

The World Health Organization said in 2022 (pdf) that, up to February 2021, it received 367 reports of tinnitus following COVID-19 vaccination, including 56 that were grouped with hearing losses. The majority (293 cases, or 80 percent) received the Pfizer vaccine. More than 70 percent of the total tinnitus cases were among females. Over a third of the reports were from healthcare professionals.

From the 367 cases, 97 incidents (26 percent) were recorded as serious. This included 59 cases classified as “other medically important condition,” 33 as “disabling/incapacitating,” and eight reports as “caused/prolonged hospitalization.” Two incidences were reported as “life-threatening.”

The organization also separately reported 164 cases of hearing loss, of which 104 cases (63 percent) were found among females.

In an interview with The Epoch Times, Mary, who declined to disclose her last name, said that she started experiencing tinnitus an hour after the first Pfizer shot in 2021. When she contacted the pharmacy where she was vaccinated, Mary was told that tinnitus wasn’t a side effect.

Even after taking steroid therapy as recommended by a physician, her condition didn’t improve. “I complained about it so much in the beginning … especially in the first couple of weeks,” she said. ‘I cried. I broke down.”

Despite facing difficulties, Mary could not openly discuss her concerns with her family, friends, or health providers. “I felt comfortable saying that I had tinnitus, but I was afraid to tell people that it started an hour after the vaccine ... I didn’t want people to think that I’m an anti-vaxxer,” she stated.

“But it’s my own experience, and the fact that I was afraid to say that is really sad.”

https://www.theepochtimes.com/health/study-finds-hearing-and-balance-disorders-among-covid-19-vaccinated-5594475?ea_src=au-frontpage&ea_med=top-news-australia-top-news-0-large-2

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Australia: Leftist health commentator admits some Covid vaccines had serious side effects after largest ever study released

See:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264410X24001270?via%3Dihub#s0090

ABC health expert Norman Swan has admitted the Covid vaccines produced unexpected side effects but considers them to be akin to 'winning the lotto three times in your lifetime'.

Dr Swan was commenting on the largest ever study done into adverse reactions from Covid vaccines which was published last week.

'They uncovered side effects they hadn’t quite expected and they did show up as a signal there,' Dr Swan told ABC interviewer Jeremy Fernandez on Monday.

However, Dr Swan stressed that the side effects seen in the study's 99million subjects who received Pfizer, Moderna, and AstraZeneca shots were 'rare'.

He said Guillain-Barre syndrome was a side effect of the AstraZeneca vaccine that received particular attention in the study.

He described it as a 'descending paralysis of the body that affects the nervous system'.

'Usually in most people it is a temporary phenomenon but it can be quite serious at the time,' Dr Swan said.

An unexpected side effect of the Moderna vaccine was acute disseminated encephalomyelitis.

'So, this is essentially a brain inflammation usually seen in children but in this case in older people, these are largely 20 to 60-year-olds,' Dr Swan said.

'He described the condition as 'self-limiting and quite nasty'.

Dr Swan said that this condition was still extremely rare with only seven cases seen out of 10million injections.

He likened the probability of getting it to 'winning the biggest lotto three times in your lifetime'.

Asked how applicable the study was to Australians, Dr Swan said it included Aussies and people from similar countries such as Canada.

Dr Swan has been a strong advocate for getting the Covid vaccines despite initially dismissing their likely efficacy and saying those who took them were 'guinea pigs'.

In July 2022 the Scottish-born medical commentator revealed he had caught Covid for the second time despite having four jabs.

The study Dr Swan was citing involved an international coalition of vaccine experts who looked for 13 medical conditions among 99million vaccine recipients across eight countries.

They confirmed that the shots made by Pfizer, Moderna, and AstraZeneca are linked to significantly higher risk of five medical afflictions including Guillain-Barre syndrome.

But the study also warned of several other disorders that they said warranted further investigation, including the links between a brain-swelling condition and the Moderna shot.

However, the team says the absolute risk of developing any one of the conditions remains small.

They said 13billion doses of vaccines had been administered and there have only been 2,000 cases of all conditions.

Their research was published in the journal Vaccine.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13128663/ABC-health-expert-Dr-Norman-Swan-admits-Covid-vaccines-effects-largest-study-released.html

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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Voters, Not the Doctor’s Union, Will Elect or Reject Vaccine Critic

Tasmania goes to early polls on March 23. The centre-right Liberal Party has selected Dr. Julie Sladden, a registered general practitioner and emergency medicine doctor since 1997, to contest the northern electorate of Bass.

The Australian Medical Association (AMA) wants her deselected.

AMA Tasmania vice president, Dr. Annette Barratt, says Dr. Sladden’s candidacy is “untenable.” Premier Jeremy Rockliff is standing by her.

Dr. Sladden closed her practice in 2021 because of strong objections to the COVID-19 vaccine.

Writing in the Spectator Australia in 2022, she explained that as a well-travelled doctor, she was more vaccinated than most people.

When the COVID vaccines arrived on the scene, she calculated her COVID infection survival rate was 99 percent.

Early data showed comparable transmission rates between the vaccinated and unvaccinated, but also some worrying safety signals with no long-term toxicity, carcinogenicity, genotoxicity, or fertility studies.

She concluded that for her, “the risks did not outweigh the benefits, especially if it meant I could still infect my patients.”

Her efforts to communicate her concerns to Tasmanian politicians mostly fell on deaf ears. That is when, as far as the health establishment is concerned, she became an “anti-vaxxer.”

She has penned many thoughtful, informative, and well-written articles since then.

Her six-month-old article for Brownstone on “The Vax-Gene Files,” co-authored with Julian Gillespie, remains the 10th most popular article on that site. My respect for her grew with her work with the Australians for Science and Freedom that I helped to establish.

There is a legitimate debate to be had on the efficacy and effectiveness of COVID vaccines in preventing/reducing infection and transmission, on the age-disaggregated harms-benefits equation, and on the science and ethics underpinning mandates, as opposed to recommendations and guidance.

This worldwide ongoing debate is being conducted by well-qualified and highly credentialed people.

Dr. Barratt believes “COVID vaccines have saved lives and continue to do so.” This remains the prevailing opinion in the medical establishment.

But many experts share doubts about the net benefits of universal COVID-vaccination and have come together in groups like the Australian Medical Professionals’ Society (AMPS), the Health Advisory & Recovery Team (HART) in the UK, and the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC) in the United States.
These alliances were needed because critics of COVID-19 interventions felt the full force of stifling intellectual conformity. Regulators threatened dissenting doctors with professional disciplinary action.

Although the threat was carried out in only a few instances, the modest numbers do not invalidate the tactic.

On the medical freedom side, that which is beyond question is not science but dogma. Science is a work in progress, not an encyclopaedia of facts. The long arc of science bends towards truth, but progress is neither linear nor irreversible.

Scientists have a responsibility to subject the existing consensus to searching scrutiny in line with empirical observations. They must have the corresponding right to challenge the prevailing dominant narratives.

Diversity viewpoints on contested elements of knowledge, and rejection of attempts to suppress dissenting voices, provide necessary guardrails against reverses of knowledge.

On the political freedom side, it’s extraordinary that anyone should seek to deny a duly selected candidate, of any political party, the opportunity to contest an election. Pre-selection is a matter solely for the party concerned. Voting is a matter for the citizens of Tasmania.

Who appointed the AMA as the custodians of Australian democracy?

Did Australia’s COVID-19 policy interventions represent the greatest triumph of public policy, with an unprecedented high number of lives saved as a result of timely, decisive, and appropriate measures instituted by governments acting on the science- and evidence-based advice of experts? Or will they prove to be the biggest public policy disaster of all time?

The 2020–22/23 years were among the most disruptive in many countries, including Australia. The herd panic of early 2020 led to an abandonment of good process, an abandonment of carefully prepared pandemic preparedness plans, and a centralisation of decision-making in a narrow circle of heads of government, ministers, and health bureaucrats and experts.

The rules and regulations made on the run represented a hysterical mix of ignorance, incompetence, and/or malfeasance. The damaging health, mental health, social, educational, and economic consequences will continue to impact public life well into the future.

Core Principles

The doctor-patient relationship in Western societies has long been governed by four important principles: the sanctity of the doctor-patient relationship; first, do no harm or at least, avoid doing more harm than good; informed consent; and prioritising the health outcomes of the patient over that of any collective group.
All four principles were gravely compromised with COVID.

Colleges and bureaucrats operating at a remote distance are not better placed than the doctor to assess the best interests of the patient.

The AMA should have been at the forefront of vigorously defending the sacrosanct principles that have delivered Australians among the best health outcomes in the world.

Instead, Dr. Barratt and the AMA are betraying authoritarian instincts in seeking to remove Dr. Sladden as a duly pre-selected candidate.

Little wonder that some doctors express concern the AMA has morphed from a union representing doctors into a bureaucratic institution run by careerists. Often, in my opinion, they seem more interested in attacking other doctors than representing the best interests of the diverse group.

They are free to challenge Dr. Sladden to a debate and argue their case for mandatory vaccines.

Good luck with that in the current political environment, with only 3.3 percent of 18-64 year olds choosing to be boosted in the last six months.
The criticism of Dr. Sladden is a bad development for the health of Australian democracy.

In fact, it is the AMA that owes the people of Tasmania an apology for this unwarranted intrusion into the electoral process.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/opinion/tasmanian-voters-not-the-doctors-union-will-elect-or-reject-sladden-5594626

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UK Health Advisory Team Calls For Suspension Of Covid Boosters

Britain’s Health Advisory and Recovery Team co-chair Dr. Claire Craig, supported by the UK Medical Freedom Alliance, and Children’s Covid Vaccine Advisory Council, issued this joint open letter to Victoria Atkins, MP, Secretary of State for Health and Social Care on February 6, 2024

This letter was appended with dozens of physician-scientist signatures.

To: The Right Hon Victoria Atkins, MP, Secretary of State for Health and Social Care

CC: Dame Jenny Harries, CEO UKHSA; Professor Sir Christopher Whitty, CMO; Maria Caulfield MP

Dear Ms Atkins

Re: Urgent Review of Excess Deaths

Firstly, congratulations on your recent appointment as Secretary of State at the DHSC.

Your three months in office have given you time to see for yourself how much the NHS is struggling; with rising waiting lists, low staff morale and the devastating strike action. You will also be aware of the ongoing and concerning excess deaths in the UK, recently debated in Parliament.

The fact that this is occurring in many Western countries and across all age groups, particularly younger adults for whom there were no excess deaths during 2020, should trigger alarm bells and prompt an urgent investigation.

In addition, in parallel with increased deaths, there has been a significant rise in levels of sickness and disability recorded throughout the working age population.

This has resulted in not only increased demands on the health service, but also has impacted the health and resilience of NHS staff themselves, with resulting high levels of staff sickness and absence, causing additional strain on an already struggling system.

The causes of excess mortality and morbidity are likely multifactorial, including the physical and mental impacts of lockdowns, delays in accessing treatment and long-term effects of Covid-19 itself.

However, a fourth potential factor appears to be being deliberately ignored: that is, any possible role of the mRNA Covid-19 vaccines. The timing of the rise in disabilities and deaths should make the vaccinations a definite suspect. As early as November 2020, many scientists and doctors, including those in UKMFA, were highlighting the potential risks of a rushed vaccine.

Until this question has been thoroughly investigated, it is premature and reckless to be talking of using mRNA technology for future prophylactic vaccines (we take no view on the development of mRNA vaccines for their previously-intended role as therapeutic anti-cancer agents).

We are concerned that the Government is focused on the business opportunity for the UK, offered by the expansion of use of these technologies, but are ignoring potential risks to public health from these products, particularly to the immune and cardiovascular systems.

The failure of COVID vaccines to stop viral circulation is obvious to all. The obviousness of this failure, along with growing concern about the products’ safety – evidenced by poor uptake among those eligible – is undermining public trust in vaccination more generally, including where it is indubitably useful.

We have written repeatedly to the MHRA, the CMOs, the JCVI, and to your predecessor, regarding the many risks of rolling these vaccines out to children. Members of the Pandemic Response All Party Parliamentary Group also wrote a letter in January 2022, over two years ago, regarding increased all-cause mortality in 15–19-year-old males.

The first three signatories on this letter were all asked by Baroness Hallett to provide Witness Statements for Module 4 of the UK Covid-19 Public Inquiry; these we have recently submitted, only to learn that the date for the Module 4 hearings has been inexplicably and disappointingly postponed, likely until after the general election.

In the interim we therefore call upon you to suspend the booster programme, pending an immediate review into all aspects of Covid vaccine safety, as outlined in our letter to the MHRA a year ago.

The health of the nation’s citizens is of paramount concern and must surely be a high priority for an incoming Minister.

We entreat you to apply the precautionary principle regarding the use of these products, which have been linked (in published scientific literature, adverse event databases and real-world epidemiological data) to numerous short- and long-term safety issues, particularly after multiple doses.

Pausing their use is now becoming widely recognised to be the only rational, responsible and morally justifiable course of action.

We wish you well in the challenging job you have ahead.

Yours sincerely

Open letters such as these are important all over the world because they prompt actions that should be taken, provide notice to the public that concerns are real, and take away plausible deniability for political leaders concerning the Covid vaccine safety debacle.

https://principia-scientific.com/uk-health-advisory-team-calls-for-suspension-of-covid-boosters/

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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Effect of Higher-Dose Ivermectin for 6 Days vs Placebo on Time to Sustained Recovery in Outpatients With COVID-19. A Randomized Clinical Trial

The article below appeared in JAMA, a prestigious medical journal. Like previous similar articles, it found no benefit for Ivermectin in treating Covid-19.

The study is carefully done but overlooks a major caution for Ivermectin usage. While some clinicians claim benefit for Ivermectin at all stages of the disease, well-informed researchers are clear that benefit is to be found only if Ivermectin is given immediately after symptom onset. The study did not examine that. A 7 day treatment window was allowed. N would probably have been too small for useful analysis if the proper restrictions were observed so we await an experimental study before firm conclusions can be drawn


Susanna Naggie, et al.

Question Does ivermectin, with a maximum targeted dose of 600 μg/kg daily for 6 days, compared with placebo, shorten symptom duration among adult (≥30 years) outpatients with symptomatic mild to moderate COVID-19?

Findings In this double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled platform trial including 1206 US adults with COVID-19 during February 2022 to July 2022, the median time to sustained recovery was 11 days in the ivermectin group and 11 days in the placebo group. In this largely vaccinated (84%) population, the posterior probability that ivermectin reduced symptom duration by more than 1 day was less than 0.1%.

Meaning These findings do not support the use of ivermectin among outpatients with COVID-19.

Abstract
Importance It is unknown whether ivermectin, with a maximum targeted dose of 600 μg/kg, shortens symptom duration or prevents hospitalization among outpatients with mild to moderate COVID-19.

Objective To evaluate the effectiveness of ivermectin at a maximum targeted dose of 600 μg/kg daily for 6 days, compared with placebo, for the treatment of early mild to moderate COVID-19.

Design, Setting, and Participants The ongoing Accelerating COVID-19 Therapeutic Interventions and Vaccines 6 (ACTIV-6) platform randomized clinical trial was designed to evaluate repurposed therapies among outpatients with mild to moderate COVID-19. A total of 1206 participants older than 30 years with confirmed COVID-19 experiencing at least 2 symptoms of acute infection for less than or equal to 7 days were enrolled at 93 sites in the US from February 16, 2022, through July 22, 2022, with follow-up data through November 10, 2022.

Interventions Participants were randomly assigned to receive ivermectin, with a maximum targeted dose of 600 μg/kg (n = 602) daily, or placebo (n = 604) for 6 days.

Main Outcomes and Measures The primary outcome was time to sustained recovery, defined as at least 3 consecutive days without symptoms. The 7 secondary outcomes included a composite of hospitalization, death, or urgent/emergent care utilization by day 28.

Results Among 1206 randomized participants who received study medication or placebo, the median (IQR) age was 48 (38-58) years, 713 (59.1%) were women, and 1008 (83.5%) reported receiving at least 2 SARS-CoV-2 vaccine doses. The median (IQR) time to sustained recovery was 11 (11-12) days in the ivermectin group and 11 (11-12) days in the placebo group. The hazard ratio (posterior probability of benefit) for improvement in time to recovery was 1.02 (95% credible interval, 0.92-1.13; P = .68). Among those receiving ivermectin, 34 (5.7%) were hospitalized, died, or had urgent or emergency care visits compared with 36 (6.0%) receiving placebo (hazard ratio, 1.0 [95% credible interval, 0.6-1.5]; P = .53). In the ivermectin group, 1 participant died and 4 were hospitalized (0.8%); 2 participants (0.3%) were hospitalized in the placebo group and there were no deaths. Adverse events were uncommon in both groups.

Conclusions and Relevance Among outpatients with mild to moderate COVID-19, treatment with ivermectin, with a maximum targeted dose of 600 μg/kg daily for 6 days, compared with placebo did not improve time to sustained recovery. These findings do not support the use of ivermectin in patients with mild to moderate COVID-19.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2801827

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Large COVID-19 vaccine study finds risks

A Leftist take on the matter from "Salon"

Even while the COVID-19 vaccines have been hailed as one of the greatest achievements in modern science, they have been swirled in misinformation perpetuated by anti-vaccine figures and organizations who question their efficacy and robust safety record. The shots have even been wrongly blamed for high-profile health events, like when LeBron "Bronny" James Jr. suffered a cardiac arrest during practice. While research has shown that a COVID-19 infection is linked to an increased risk in myocarditis, which is inflammation of the heart muscle, how — and if — that translates to causation from vaccines has been widely taken out of context.

But now, a new study, published in the journal Vaccine, examined the potential health effects of the coronavirus vaccines. In its international attempt to separate fact from fiction, scientists have found that there are some links between the vaccines and adverse health effects to be aware of — but more research is needed to land on any definitive conclusions.

“What we wanted to do was to see if there was any signal to suggest that COVID vaccines might be associated with an increased risk of certain medical events occurring,” Helen Petousis-Harris, a co-author of the study and co-director of the Global Vaccine Data Network, told Salon. “So what we did was we compared what we would normally expect to see — because these events occur all the time — what would you normally expect to see, and what are we actually seeing.”

The study included 99 million people across eight countries and found that the first, second and third doses of Pfizer-BioNTech’s and Moderna’s mRNA vaccines were linked to rare cases of myocarditis. Specifically, people who received a second dose of Moderna vaccine were 6.1 times more likely to have myocarditis. The condition also developed among people who received the Pfizer vaccine while researchers identified that pericarditis had a 6.9-fold increased risk for those who received a third dose of AstraZeneca’s vaccine.

There was also a 2.5-times increased risk of developing the rare autoimmune disorder called Guillain-Barré syndrome linked to those who received AstraZeneca’s vaccine. Separate research has found that COVID itself can cause this syndrome at a rate far higher than vaccines.

Petousis-Harris told Salon in general that the researchers weren’t surprised with the findings, in part because previous research had already pointed to the rare risk associated with vaccination and conditions like myocarditis and pericarditis. But they did pick up something that hadn’t been discussed before: a link between AstraZeneca's viral-vector vaccine and acute disseminated encephalomyelitis, a rare condition that causes inflammation and swelling in the brain and spinal cord.

“And what that enabled was to take the next step, to a different kind of study, to really ask the question: Is this a problem?” she said. “Our colleagues in Australia performed a study in 6 million people, which is in the same issue, to look at that, and found that essentially after the viral-vector vaccines, the risk is about less than one extra case per million doses. So very very rare.”

Notably, the risk was not observed in the mRNA vaccine design.

As Salon has previously reported, COVID-19 vaccines changed the course of the pandemic. The mRNA technology, which was novel at the time, allowed for an effective vaccine to be developed in record time. Yet what the scientific community saw as a historic moment for biotechnology turned into a polarizing debate among American lawmakers who fell for conspiracy theories and misinformation surrounding the vaccines — marking a pivotal turning point for the anti-vaccine movement. Typically, misinformation about vaccines doesn't appear out of nowhere. There is usually a kernel of truth to it, and the misinformation persists because it lacks context.

Unsurprisingly, this study is already being used to justify long-held concerns about the vaccines. But experts say that doesn’t come as a shock and that misrepresenting this study doesn’t tell the whole story about weighing the risk between being unvaccinated and getting infected with COVID-19, and getting vaccinated against COVID-19. For example, previous research has found that the risk of myocarditis is seven times higher from getting a coronavirus infection than getting vaccinated.

Glen Pyle, a molecular cardiologist who investigates cardiac injury associated with COVID-19, told Salon via email the most recent study is “a great example of the continuous safety monitoring that vaccines are subjected to, and it confirms much of the safety work already done.”

“For example, with adverse events like myocarditis it shows that these events are very rare,” he said. “And when we stack these rare risks up against the overwhelming cardiovascular benefits of vaccination, the case for vaccination becomes clear.”

Pyle added that this study highlights the need for public health experts to communicate the risks of vaccination and how common they are in the right context.

“For example, myocarditis is a very rare complication that increases primarily in younger males,” he said. “On the other hand, cardiac arrhythmias are far more common and they increase significantly with infection, but not vaccination — in fact, vaccination decreases these risks.”

He added there are “small but real increases in rare risks after vaccination, compared to large increases in very common risks with COVID-19.”

This strengthens the case for vaccination, and why cardiovascular societies throughout the world recommend vaccination, especially for people with cardiovascular conditions. Petousis-Harris said it’s hard when a study like this is published because “risk communication” is a complex science on its own.

“You have lots of ways you need to communicate this, and I think it's vital to be open and transparent with people, but you also have to work hard at how you are able to present to them,” she said. “I think it's important to empower our people who are health professionals and vaccinators to be able to confidently have those conversations with people and have the tools that they need to help show people what the risks look like.”

She emphasized that any pharmaceutical has risk of side effects.

“Probably vaccines are the safest of all pharmaceuticals by a longshot,” Petousis-Harris said. “One of the challenges is actually expressing how safe they really are. And another challenge is that we have health events happen by chance all the time, and they may or may not be related to a vaccine.”

She added that what has become clear is that it’s been difficult for people to grasp this nuance when it comes to the COVID-19 vaccines.

“People are really interpreting anything bad that happens after the vaccine has therefore been caused by the vaccine,” Petousis-Harris said. Notably, the study only examines links and associations — potential “safety signals,” it’s not definitively declaring a cause. “Ultimately, if the issue is transparency, this is transparent.”

https://www.salon.com/2024/02/23/major-vaccine-study-finds-heart-risks-are-rare--and-the-real-is-being-unvaccinated/

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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Immunosuppression Prevalence Doubled, Linked to Medication Use and COVID: Experts

Between 2013 and 2021, rates of immunosuppression in adults have doubled, according to estimates from a Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) research letter.

In 2021, an estimated 6.6 percent of U.S. adults were immunosuppressed. “This rate of immunosuppression was higher than the previous national estimate of 2.7 percent using the 2013 [National Health Interview Survey],” the authors wrote in their paper.

The researchers estimated immunosuppression prevalence by analyzing National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) results.

Specifically, the authors analyzed responses to five questions. Over 29,000 individuals were asked if they had a health condition or were taking medication or treatments that would weaken their immune system. They were also asked if they had cancer or malignancy, the type of cancer, and their age at the time of cancer diagnosis.

In 2013, over 34,000 people were interviewed, garnering a response from 75 percent of households. In 2021, only about half of the households contacted responded to the survey.
Why the Rise in Immunosuppression?

“Given the documented increase in immunosuppression, studies are needed to understand the causes for this increase,” the authors wrote. However, they mentioned that the rise in self-reported immunosuppression may be due to increased use of immunosuppressive medications.

The use of adalimumab, a drug used to treat autoimmune conditions, has increased 3.5-fold between 2014 and 2021.

Immunosuppression carries significant risks, “including an increased susceptibility to infections, potential organ rejection, side effects of immunosuppressant drugs, elevated cancer risk, and pregnancy-related concerns,” Mohammad Razzaque, professor of pathology at the Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine, told The Epoch Times.

Immunosuppression occurs naturally with age, but it can also occur due to the individual being on various immunosuppressive therapies. People undergoing such therapies include organ transplant patients and those with autoimmune diseases or cancer.

Dr. William Schaffner, a professor of medicine and preventative medicine at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, reasoned that the rising prevalence could signify progress in science and health.

“There are more and more people being kept alive and are being treated with immunosuppressant agents in the United States, and that treatment is extending life, which means that the proportion of the population that is immunosuppressed is increasing,” Dr. Schaffner said.

Crude data from NHIS have also shown a rise in self-reported rates of cancer. According to 2015 U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) statistics, 8.7 percent of adults reported cancer. In 2021, it was estimated that 9.8 percent of adults had cancer.

NHIS' most recent survey in 2022 estimated that a slight decrease of 9.6 percent of adults had cancer.

The COVID-19 pandemic may have also made individuals more aware of their immune health and whether they are immunosuppressed, the research letter authors added.

COVID-19 and Immunosuppression

Studies have shown that the COVID-19 virus can disrupt the function and order of the immune system, leading to immune dysfunction and possible immunodeficiency.

One 2o23 study published in Nature Reviews Rheumatology found that people with a COVID-19 infection are at a greater risk of developing autoimmune diseases, which may be linked to potential immunodeficiencies.

The COVID-19 pandemic may have been particularly challenging to those already immunocompromised.

Immunocompromised people tend to have an increased disease severity if they become infected with COVID-19, and the vaccine appears to be less effective for them. Public health measures put in place during the pandemic may also have created obstacles for these people to access health care and therapies for their immunosuppression, said Mr. Razzaque.

Other researchers and physicians argue that the COVID-19 vaccines may also contribute to immunosuppression and deficiencies, though some research has opposite findings.

Research from Cleveland Clinic suggests that repeated boosting of COVID-19 vaccinations has been shown to put a person at risk of future COVID-19 infections. Another letter to the editor from Columbia University authors published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that people with higher vaccine antibody levels after vaccination were more strongly associated with breakthrough infections.

Most recently, an Australian review suggested that repeat COVID-19 vaccine boosting in immunocompromised individuals may impair immune activation within this population, possibly making them more vulnerable to infections and cancers.

In a research paper, Mr. Razzaque pointed to increased influenza infections reported in people who receive repeat influenza vaccinations, speculating if frequent boosting may be linked to immunosuppression.

Dr. Schaffner said whether increased infections linked to repeat vaccinations are a sign of general immunosuppression is debatable.

“It’s a very debatable issue,” he said, adding that even if there is an increased risk of COVID-19 infection linked to repeat vaccination, there does not seem to be “serious evidence” indicating a “general suppression of the immune system.”

However, works by Nordic researchers Drs. Peter Aaby and Christine Stabell Benn suggest that non-live vaccines, including COVID-19 and influenza vaccines, tend to make the immune system “lazy” and less equipped to fight an infection. In contrast, live vaccines train the immune system to become better fighters.

Gastroenterologist and CEO of ProgenaBiome, Dr. Sabine Hazan, has said that the COVID-19 vaccine may cause immunosuppression by reducing good Bifidobacteria in the gut. She showed that after COVID-19 mRNA vaccination, Bifidobacteria levels dropped by half among her trial participants.

Bifidobacteria are essential for boosting intestinal immunity. Dr. Hazan’s earlier work showed that people with reduced Bifidobacteria in the gut were at risk of severe COVID-19 infections, and therapeutics that replenished the Bifidobacteria, such as vitamins C and D and ivermectin improved patient survival rates.

“The pandemic appears to have influenced what the public thinks about their immune system. There has been a big jump in perceived weakness in the immune system. More research is needed to determine if either SARS-CoV-2 infection or COVID-19 vaccine indeed has impaired human immunity according to these perceptions,” Dr. Peter McCullough, renowned cardiologist and internist, told The Epoch Times.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/health/immunosuppression-prevalence-doubled-linked-to-medication-use-and-covid-experts-5591430?ea_src=ai_recommender&ea_med=desktop_health

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Nova Scotia Health Authority Rescinds COVID Vaccine Mandate for Health Care Workers

The Nova Scotia Health Authority has announced it will be rescinding its COVID-19 vaccine mandate for health care workers due to the pandemic entering its endemic phase and its “commitment to respecting the choices and autonomy of our staff members.”

“Based on the current available evidence, Nova Scotia Health and IWK Health are amending their respective policies,” reads a joint statement released on Feb. 21 by the two health authorities, which was originally obtained by The Canadian Independent.

“Effective February 26, 2024, it will no longer be a requirement for employees, preferred candidates and on-site medical staff to submit proof of primary series COVID-19 immunization.”

The health organizations said the change represented the “evolving landscape of COVID-19 in its endemic phase.” They added that vaccination against the disease remained “highly effective” at preventing disease, hospitalization, and death, and encouraged all eligible residents to receive their boosters.

The organizations said the change in policy means health care workers who did not submit proof of vaccination and were subsequently let go from work would have the chance to “return to active employment.” Nova Scotia and IWK Health will be reaching out to those employees on administrative leave to discuss options for them to return to work.

Many Canadian provinces got rid of their vaccine mandates for health care workers in 2022, with Saskatchewan lifting the requirement on Feb. 14, Manitoba lifting the requirement on March 1, Ontario lifting it on March 14, New Brunswick ending it on April 11, Newfoundland ending it June 1, and Alberta lifting it on July 18.

The province of Quebec backed down from making COVID-19 vaccines mandatory for health care workers back in November 2021, as a Superior Court judge ruled in favour of a group of unvaccinated health care workers.

British Columbia is the only province that still has a COVID-19 vaccine mandate in place for health care workers. In September 2023, a vote was held at the Union of B.C. Municipalities about the mandate, which saw municipal leaders vote against a motion rescinding the policy.

The company Purolator suspended its COVID-19 vaccine mandate on April 13, 2023, asking employees who had been placed on unpaid leave to return to work by May 1. Following nearly a year of arbitration, Arbitrator Nicholas Glass ruled in a Dec. 14 decision that Purolator must compensate employees who were terminated for not receiving a COVID-19 vaccine.

A recent survey conducted by the Public Health Agency of Canada found that one-third of doctors and over half of nurses were reluctant to take the COVID-19 vaccine because they feared potential side effects. The research found that despite many health workers being reluctant, 89 percent received the vaccines, with the most commonly reported reason being a fear of job loss.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/world/nova-scotia-health-authority-rescinds-covid-vaccine-mandate-for-health-care-workers-5592175

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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COVID Booster Shots Carry ‘Increased Myocarditis Risk’ for Young Adults: Nordic Study

Booster vaccination against COVID-19 is linked to a higher risk of heart inflammation among adolescents, according to a recent study using data from several Nordic nations.

The peer-reviewed study, published in the European Heart Journal on Feb. 15, evaluated the risk of myocarditis among 12- to 39-year-olds after receiving COVID-19 mRNA booster vaccination. Myocarditis refers to an inflammation of the heart muscle myocardium. The study analyzed data from 8.9 million young adults from four nations: Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden.

In total, 1,533 cases of myocarditis were identified with the study concluding that the “booster dose is associated with increased myocarditis risk in adolescents and young adults.”

Among males, a third dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine was associated with an “increased incidence rate of myocarditis” within 28 days of inoculation compared to a longer period after the second dose.

The study noted that the association of myocarditis with COVID-19 mRNA vaccines has appeared “strongest in male adolescents and younger males and after the second dose.”

The study was authored by 12 experts from the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Swedish Medical Products Agency, Statens Serum Institut, and the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare.

Significant Spike in Cases

Cases of myocarditis among vaccinated individuals in the United States spiked within the first year of the COVID-19 vaccination campaign, according to a study published in late January that looked at data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS).

“We found the number of myocarditis reports in VAERS after COVID-19 vaccination in 2021 was 223 times higher than the average of all vaccines combined for the past 30 years. This represented a [2,500 percent] increase in the absolute number of reports in the first year of the campaign when comparing historical values prior to 2021,” the U.S. study said.

Roughly 50 percent of myocarditis cases occurred among youths and 69 percent of affected individuals were males. Out of a total of 3,078 COVID-19 vaccine-induced myocarditis cases as of August 2023, 76 percent resulted in emergency care and hospitalization, and 3 percent died.

New studies are being published looking at reducing myocarditis risk when vaccinating adolescents against COVID-19, appearing to confirm the fact that such a risk exists for the shots.

A Feb. 14 study in the journal Vaccines found that extending the interval between the first and the second dose of COVID-19 mRNA vaccines leads to a 66 percent “lower risk of incident carditis among adolescents.”

Carditis is the general term for inflammation of the heart.

The study referred to adolescents as a “vulnerable population” while pointing out that “previous studies indicate an increased carditis risk among adolescents following the two-dose messenger RNA COVID-19 vaccine.”

COVID-19 and Myocarditis

There have been suggestions that COVID-19 infections cause more myocarditis cases than the vaccines.

For instance, a study published by the American College of Cardiology in 2022 said that “overall, the risk of myocarditis is greater after SARS-CoV-2 infection than after COVID-19 vaccination.”

Dr. Daniel Jernigan from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently testified at a hearing of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic. In his testimony, Dr. Jernigan claimed that the risk of getting myocarditis is “much lower among those vaccinated than among those that are unvaccinated.”

However, cardiologist Dr. Peter McCullough disputes the claim that COVID-19 infections cause myocarditis.

In a post on his website, he described this argument as “a twisted rationale for giving out COVID-19 vaccines, and in a perverted manner, creating more myocarditis in the population. If SARS-CoV-2 infection caused myocarditis or inflammation of heart muscle tissue, then it would be seen on autopsy in fatal cases of COVID-19.”

Dr. McCullough cited an October 2022 study involving an autopsy of the hearts of COVID-19 infected individuals. The analysis “concluded the virus does not infect the heart,” he said.

The cardiologist called claims of the COVID-19 virus infecting the heart and causing myocarditis “false claims made from automated hospital data and not adjudicated, autopsy proven cases.”

“The COVID-19 vaccines install mRNA in the heart and the Spike protein directly damages and incites inflammation into the heart muscle causing the pathophysiology we see every day in cardiology practice,” he wrote.

Researchers from a Jan. 24 study who looked into the initial phase 3 trials of Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 mRNA vaccines found that their estimated harms “greatly outweigh the rewards.”

They called on world governments to impose a “global moratorium” on the COVID-19 vaccines “given the well-documented [serious adverse events] and unacceptable harm-to-reward ratio.”

The authors also recommended an “immediate removal” of COVID-19 vaccines from the childhood immunization schedule, pointing out that children were at very low risk of infection.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/health/covid-booster-shots-carry-increased-myocarditis-risk-for-young-adults-nordic-study-5588852

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Did lockdowns cause more harm than good?

The question of whether lockdowns caused more problems than they solved will be picked over for years to come, even if the official Covid-19 inquiry shows little interest in peering into the matter. The latest contribution, a paper from Lund University in Sweden, provides further evidence that this really is something that a UK inquiry needs to investigate. The paper, published by the Institute for Economic Affairs, seeks correlations between the severity of lockdown restrictions in 25 European OECD members and outcomes in terms of excess deaths, economic growth and public deficits. It seems to provide a fairly clear answer: lockdowns were associated with higher overall levels of excess deaths, poorer economic performance and higher public debt.

It starts by using a marking system for the severity of lockdown, which gives every country a figure of between 0 and 100 – where 0 would be no Covid measures at all and 100 a cessation of all economic and social life. On the this measure the UK comes out at 50, France 48 and Italy 60. Sweden was given a lockdown rating of 39. Interestingly, although Sweden was perceived as an outlier throughout the pandemic, and indeed it did plough a very different furrow in the early weeks, Norway and Finland were given slightly lower overall lockdown scores for the duration of the pandemic, owing to the greater relaxation of measures during the rest of 2020.

Overall, the study establishes a fairly weak positive correlation between severity of lockdown and excess deaths. It establishes stronger negative correlations between severity of lockdown and economic growth, and between lockdown severity and the fiscal cost of the pandemic (as measured by the size of the budget deficit in 2020 and 2021 divided by GDP in 2019).

In other words, lockdowns impacted negatively on the economy and the public finances, as might be expected, but they also appear to be associated with slightly higher rates of excess deaths. The study uses excess deaths rather than Covid deaths because it is trying to assess the total effect of lockdowns: how many lives they saved against how many lives they cost through poverty, loneliness, a failure of people to seek timely healthcare because they had been told to stay at home etc.

There are, however, a number of caveats to be put against these findings. Firstly, as the authors admit, the system for giving countries a lockdown score is largely subjective. This part was not in fact the work of the authors – they used a scoring system developed for an earlier study. Secondly, the study doesn’t account for the fact that different countries had different levels of exposure to the virus – which was bound to spread differently in a country like Britain, which has a high density of population and many interconnections with the rest of the world, than in say Norway, with a much lower population density, smaller urban areas and fewer international flights. Indeed, the pattern of excess deaths in Sweden reflects the number of people who had travelled to the Alps for skiing holidays in early 2020 – the areas where more people went to the Alps suffered higher death rates.

Thirdly, it overlooks the fact that lockdowns were often a consequence of high death rates rather than the other way about – Britain, for example, had two further lockdowns in the autumn and winter of 2020-21 precisely because death rates were high and rising.

Scandinavian countries got by with fewer restrictions because death rates were lower – but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they would have ended up with more deaths had they made restrictions tougher. We will never know what would have happened had Britain, say, followed the Swedish approach. Fourthly, there are plenty of other variables which were not measured in this study. You could, for example, see what correlation existed between excess death rates and obesity rates, smoking rates or vaccination rates.

All this said, there is clearly a strong case to be made that severe lockdowns caused more misery – deaths included – than they averted. It is essential that this is properly debated before we plan for future pandemics.

https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/02/did-lockdowns-cause-more-harm-than-good/

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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