Wednesday, March 01, 2023
Do masks work? Debunking the debunker: Pueyo's attempt to debunk Cochrane fails
It is acknowledged that Mr Pueyo is not a scientist and it shows. Cochrane reviews are respected as the best evidence summary in epidemiological research and their practices are clearly scientific.
Mr Puoyo appears to be unaware of the importance of effect sizes, but the Chochrane reviewers certainly were aware. If the effect was so small as to have possibly occurred by chance, the Cochrane reviewers did the normal thing and "accepted the nul hypothesis". In this case, if mask wearing could be shown to have only a very small benefit, the Cochrane reviewers rightly concluded that they had no demonstrable effect.
Mr Pueyo's comments are in a long twitter thread here. He gets a lot of things wrong but I will refer to just two of the matters he raises.
1.) About the Aieollo et al study, Mr Pueyo excitedly declares: "The study SUPPORTS masks! But somehow, this Cochrane meta-analysis turns it around"
He totally ignores that the effect concerned was not statistically significant. It was in other words likely a random effect. In science such small effects are accepted as meaning no effect
2.) He also declares of the Abaluck study that "This is the gold standard of mask studies". I agree that it was very good. But what does it show? Again an effect so tiny as not to be accepted as proof of anything: The RR was .87. An RR of 2.0 or more would have been required to be sure that anything real was going on.
I could go on but Mr Pueyo clearly is unfamiliar with normal scientific method. The Cochrane authors WERE following normal scientific procedures in concliuding that there was no evidence to show that masks have any effect. His critique of them fails
A major Covid study which came to the stunning conclusion that face masks were all but useless has been torn to shreds in a scathing take-down.
A recent Cochrane Review – considered the gold standard of evidence-based medicine – assessed 78 high-quality scientific studies, and found “wearing masks in the community probably makes little or no difference” when comparing masking with non-masking to prevent Covid-19.
What’s more, the review found, even for health care workers providing routine care, “there were no clear differences” between medical or surgical masks versus N95s.
The bombshell findings proved controversial, with mask critics seizing on the findings to slam government responses to the pandemic, while supporters argued a different conclusion might have been reached if more and better studies had been available.
But now, Tomas Pueyo – a Silicon Valley executive and writer who made headlines with his detailed modelling of Covid’s spread during the pandemic – has weighed in on the debate, poring over the details and claiming what he found was “so ridiculous it was funny”.
Taking to Twitter, Mr Pueyo – who is not a scientist, but a noted author who analyses “how the world works to shape the future” – said Oxford epidemiologist and the review’s lead author Tom Jefferson’s claim that “there is just no evidence that masks make any difference, full stop” was a “hardcore statement”.
He then broke down the review’s findings to argue his point, revealing there were three groups of studies included.
The first, which covered flu and Covid-like illnesses, found that masks probably work.
The second, which included lab-confirmed flu and Covid cases, found masks increase infections by +1 per cent, and the results for the third lab-confirmed non flu/Covid viruses were -42 per cent.
“But that’s not saying ‘masks don’t work’. That’s saying, ‘We don’t know if masks work.’ Quite a different statement!” he explained.
He then narrowed the findings down further, noting that some studies included in the review were from as far back as the noughties while others included alarmingly small sample sizes.
In one particularly problematic study included in the review, 7700 people out of millions making the Hajj annual Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca from 2013 to 2015 – well before Covid struck – were given free masks and told to wear them for four out of up to six days of the pilgrimage.
Unsurprisingly, that trial was “unable to provide conclusive evidence on face mask efficacy against viral respiratory infections most likely due to poor adherence to protocol”.
However, that clearly flawed study was used by the review to argue that masks increased infections by 40 per cent.
“I mean, they’re technically right on that 40 per cent. That’s what the study recorded. But they couldn’t claim [with] a straight face that masks did that pre-Covid, when nobody had a political opinion about it, or where 2nd order effects (‘mask-wearers are too confident!’) were very unlikely,” Mr Pueyo posted.
Meanwhile, he found that another study, which actually included data collected during the pandemic, found Covid infections were lower by 18 per cent among mask wearers.
He argued the “Cochrane magicians” mixed the studies to claim masks were ineffective by disregarding the original studies’ own conclusions, counting “implausible results”, such as in the Hajj example, and doubling the weight of “convenient” studies.
“If you just go to these primary studies, you realise NONE of them support the conclusion of the meta-analysis. Brutal. If you adjust the math accordingly, you find that there’s just two relevant studies … and both say: MASKS WORK,” he continued.
“In the meantime, it sounds like very flimsy data to make bombastic statements like the one from the lead author of the study … especially since … It’s not what his own study says!”
Mr Pueyo’s criticisms of the review echo those of Australian epidemiologist and biosecurity expert Professor Raina MacIntyre, who told news.com.au recently there was “overwhelming evidence [masks] work”.
“The Cochrane review combined studies that were dissimilar – they were in different settings (healthcare and community) and measuring different outcomes (continuous use of N95 vs intermittent),” she said.
“This is like comparing apples with oranges.”
Burnet Institute director and CEO Professor Brendan Crabb shared Prof MacIntyre’s views, arguing it would be a “big mistake, a risk to public health” to perpetuate a view that face masks are of little benefit in the battle against Covid-19.
“A randomised controlled trial is not the way to determine real-world effectiveness of these clearly spectacularly successful tools,” he said. Am amazing statement!
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CDC Spreads False Information About COVID-19 Vaccine Safety
A top U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) official gave false information about COVID-19 vaccine safety to the agency's vaccine advisory panel, and a spokesperson for the agency refused to correct the misinformation.
Dr. Tom Shimabukuro, director of the CDC's Immunization Safety Office, presented on COVID-19 vaccine safety to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices on Feb. 24.
Shimabukuro went over updates to the safety signal for ischemic stroke following Pfizer bivalent booster vaccination that CDC officials detected in one of the agency's monitoring systems.
After sharing the updates, he made a false statement.
"No safety signals were detected for ischemic stroke for the primary series or monovalent boosters for Pfizer or Moderna COVID-19 vaccines in U.S. and global monitoring," Shimabukuro said.
That's not true. The CDC identified ischemic stroke as a safety signal following Moderna and Pfizer vaccination after analyzing reports to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), a different system, which the agency co-manages.
Asked for comment, Shimabukuro didn't respond. But a CDC spokesperson doubled down on the false claim.
"The statement from Dr. Shimabukuro's slides is correct. There have not been any safety signals detected at this time in the U.S. for ischemic stroke for the primary series or monovalent boosters," Katherina Grusich, the spokesperson, told The Epoch Times in an email.
The CDC has previously offered misinformation and refused to correct it.
Barbara Loe Fisher, president and co-founder of the National Vaccine Information Center, said what unfolded was concerning.
"Those of us who worked with Congress to secure vaccine safety informing, recording, and reporting provisions in the 1986 National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act-of which VAERS was one-are deeply concerned that federal health officials are deliberately ignoring signals in VAERS and that mRNA COVID shots are causing ischemic strokes and other potentially fatal complications," Fisher told The Epoch Times in an email.
The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines use messenger RNA, or mRNA, technology.
Bivalent boosters from both companies were authorized in the fall of 2022, but the primary series are still composed of the original vaccines, sometimes referred to as monovalent shots.
Shimabukuro's statement had an impact. After his presentation, while the slide with the false information was on the screen, a member of the panel highlighted it.
"I think it's important to note [the statement] for the public," Veronica McNally, president and CEO of the Fanny Strong Foundation, said before reading it in full.
Another False Statement
Dr. Helen Keipp Talbot, a member of the advisory panel, also offered false information about the safety signal.
"Previous surveillance in . U.S. systems found no evidence of increased risk of ischemic stroke or TIA [transient ischemic attack] after the primary series or monovalent COVID-19 booster vaccination for either Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna products," Keipp Talbot, an associate professor of medicine at Vanderbilt University, said during the meeting.
Keipp Talbot didn't respond to a request for comment.
The CDC announced in January that it detected a statistical signal for ischemic stroke in the elderly following Pfizer bivalent vaccination, based on records from the Vaccine Safety Datalink, a CDC-run system.
Dr. Evelyn Twentyman, also a CDC official, said in the meeting that a review of the signal uncovered no signal in any other system for the bivalent boosters and "when data for the two mRNA vaccine types are combined." She also said no ischemic stroke signal was found in other monitoring systems, including VAERS.
Twentyman referred a request for comment to Grusich, who said: "CDC has not detected a signal for ischemic stroke following bivalent Pfizer or Moderna vaccination in the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System."
Shimabukuro said an analysis of 224 reports of ischemic stroke or TIA following mRNA bivalent vaccination, as of Feb. 6, verified 67 and that 130 others are under review. The number of reports wasn't above the background rates or the occurrence of stroke among the general elderly population.
Some 2,200 cases of ischemic stroke have been reported to VAERS after mRNA vaccination, including bivalent shots, as of Feb. 10. Millions of other adverse event reports have been lodged. According to previous research (pdf), adverse events are underreported to VAERS.
Signal Hidden From Public
The CDC identified hundreds of signals for the monovalent Pfizer and Moderna vaccines when it performed an analysis called proportional reporting ratio on VAERS data for the first time in 2022.
The CDC didn't alert the public to its findings. The Epoch Times released the results of the analysis after obtaining it through a Freedom of Information Act.
The analysis was conducted on adverse events reported after vaccination from Dec. 14, 2020, to July 29, 2022.
Brianne Dressen, who was injured by the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, helped start a group called React19 to advocate for the vaccine injured. She said U.S. authorities are ignoring people who suffered strokes from the vaccines.
"The CDC's own data certainly shows this is happening," Dressen told The Epoch Times via email. "Why deny this is happening? People know when they're being lied to. It erodes public trust and their ultimate goal to increase vaccine uptake. It also hurts those suffering with these disorders who are in need of adequate recognition and care."
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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) Also here
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH) Also here
https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)
http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs
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