January 3, 2023

"'Died Suddenly'? More Than 1-in-4 Think Someone They Know Died From COVID-19 Vaccines."

Rasmussen reports.

The documentary Died Suddenly has been criticized as promoting “debunked” anti-vaccine conspiracy theories but has been seen by some 15 million people.

Forty-eight percent (48%) of Americans believe there are legitimate reasons to be concerned about the safety of COVID-19 vaccines, while 37% think people who worry about vaccine safety are spreading conspiracy theories. Another 15% are not sure.

The political breakdown is interesting:

More Democrats (85%) than Republicans (63%) or those not affiliated with either major party (64%) have been vaccinated against COVID-19. More Republicans (60%) than Democrats (44%) or the unaffiliated (43%) think there are legitimate reasons to be concerned about the safety of COVID-19 vaccines. However, there is less political difference in the number who suspect someone they know might have died from vaccine side effects – 33% of Democrats and 26% of both Republicans and the unaffiliated. 

Rasmussen downplayed the most significant discrepancy — there are 27% more Democrats who say they know someone who "might have died from vaccine side effects." That's a lot of political difference, especially since the difference seems to go in the opposite direction from the support for the vaccine, with Republicans much more likely to be worried about vaccine safety and to have resisted getting the vaccination. 

Now, maybe it's that Democrats tend to know more people who've taken the vaccine or to know more people who've died recently. Maybe Democrats simply know more people. Maybe Democrats have more of a tendency to interpret the question differently.

When people you know die, do you know why they died? There may be cultural differences about conveying the cause of death. When do you just absorb the news of the death and figure it must be from one of those things that kill people — old age, drugs, suicide, heart trouble? If you do that, then if someone asks you do you think it could have been a side effect of the vaccine, you might easily and without thinking much, say, sure. It might not mean you're particularly concerned about the vaccine. 

Another way to look at this is that supporters of the vaccine may think of course some people are going to die from it but, overall, more lives will be saved, so what's important is for everyone to do their part and contribute to the general good by getting the vaccine as prescribed. Yes, you might be one of the unlucky ones who dies because of the vaccine, but you'll never know if you would have been one of the unlucky ones who dies because you did not get the vaccine, so please just cooperate and accept the vaccine.

I would guess that Democrats are more likely to have that attitude, and that might mean that even when they hear of deaths that they think could be traced to the vaccine they tend to continue to think that there are no "legitimate reasons to be concerned about the safety of COVID-19 vaccine."

85 comments:

rehajm said...

Another way to look at this is that supporters of the vaccine may accept that of course some people are going to die from it because, overall, more lives will be saved, so what's important is for everyone to do their part and contribute to the general good but getting the vaccine as described

What is this ‘general good’ the vaccine is supposedly providing? It was once believed the vaccine stopped transmission but that claim was abandoned long ago for the vaccine as therapy line. Who is it that’s supposedly spreading misinformation again?

Enigma said...

The most credible and timely COVID commentator I've found is Dr. John Campbell. He's a retired medical professional, and has produced general medical training documents for years.

Throughout most of the pandemic he was a neutral reporter and mostly friendly to the authorities (e.g., CDC, WHO, NIH, UK medical sources), but became extremely concerned and critical in mid 2022. His recent topics include censorship, inappropriate recommendations for the young, inadequate testing of vaccines, heart conditions with the young, concern about possible conflicts of interest between regulators and pharmaceutical companies, and misallocation of health care resources. Etc.

He releases very long and frequent FULLY DOCUMENTED videos so there's a lot to dig through.

https://www.youtube.com/@Campbellteaching/videos

Spread the word. Tell a friend.

Winnie said...

I wish they would have followed up by asking if they regret getting the vaccine. I'm waiting for more data to decide if I regret it but haven't had nor plan to have boosters.

Krumhorn said...

I’m not surprised since it’s my view that most lefties are lunatics. The percentage of Democrats that are bug-eyed lefties I cannot say, but it must be a sufficiently high percentage given the unhappy results from which none of them seem to learn. Therefore, I conclude that as a nation, we are swarming with lunatics who are Democrats, and these are the kinds of responses you would expect. The lefties are batshit crazy. It’s hard to image that I was a leftie once upon a time. Fortunately, I have recovered.

- Krumhorn

gilbar said...

So, another way to look at this is that supporters of the vaccine may think course some people are going to die from it but, overall, it's WORTH IT, because of the "value" of the vaccine..

Help me out? What, Exactly, IS the "value" of the vaccine?
Does it perform some psycho-social function that i'm not aware of?
SURELY, it MUST do Something?
It doesn't stop you from getting it
It doesn't stop you from giving it
It doesn't stop you from getting it, AGAIN

It DOES take a sickness, which will almost certainly Not be fatal for most people..
And turns it into a sickness, which will almost certainly Not be fatal for most people..
THAT is Surely Worth it. Isn't It? I mean, you don't want to kill Grandma*, do you

don't want to kill Grandma* of course, You taking the vaccine can't really affect that: see above

Amadeus 48 said...

Nothing much supports the rationality of Democrats. They tend to be emotional and afraid of shadows.

Did you consider that they may know more old obese people than Republicans do7 Perhaps Dems know more people with unhealthy lifestyles. Fear, envy and resentment are a wicked brew.

And how about all that weed?

Just spitballing here.

gilbar said...

Serious Question
How would democrats be feeling about Trump's Vaccine, if He was still President?
Trump is the one that pushed this mRNA "vaccine" out, without any testing.

Lloyd W. Robertson said...

It's not a conspiracy theory to say big business saw a chance to make money, and the Swamp saw a chance to control behavior. They are not realy vaccines, and they have never been required to pass the usual safety tests. The potential benefits are more relevant to people over 60, the risks are highly relevant to anyone under 30.

michaele said...

Makes me think of a nature show I was watching last night. When a large herd of antelope type critters go into mass run for your life mode upon being chased by a predator pack, the hunted often settle back down to grazing after they see one of their own has been caught and is being fed upon by the predators. So it is with the good citizen Dems...get the vaccines and all the boosters, encourage others to join the group in the protective action and accept not all will make it...for the good of the herd and/or the country.

hombre said...

As an old guy who has had three Moderna jabs AND Covid I think people who don't think the data is cause for concern have rocks in their heads.

Of course, among my few remaining Democrat friends most don't have access to factual data, only leftmedia propaganda.

William said...

I play the probabilities. I have had the vaccine and the boosters. I'm sure there are risks involved both from the vaccine and from the disease. Perhaps the odds are in favor of those who have been vaccinated. Perhaps in the fullness of time, I'll discover my mistake....I don't know anyone who has died from either the disease or from the vaccine. I do know some people with "long" covid. It's a genuine affliction that I'd like to avoid. I'm not fat, but I'm old so I think some caution is warranted. I don't make any judgement on either those who take or don't take the vaccine....What's annoying are the true believers in masks. There's no need for children to wear one and no need for anyone outside in the park to wear one.

rhhardin said...

The vaccine seemed to work on the variant that it was designed for, both preventing getting it (90% effective was the test) and spreading it (wuhan knocked out by June 2021, which means transmission ended). The hype for its use against later variants was without data and apparently wrong. So distinguish the design use from the wing-it use on later variants.

Sean said...

I wonder if non democrats interpret people they know as friends/colleagues while democrats include celebrities, social media contacts, etc as "people they know".

Perhaps a question interpretation bias.

Temujin said...

I was reading VAERS reports during the peak of covid. It was forming very clear indicators early on that this vaccine was unlike any others. And it was not even close. The most telling thing for me just happened. I just Googled 'VAERS incidents on covid vaccine vs. all other vaccines' and got a huge list of articles and formal government or medical sites telling me that those stats are not correct or have been...and I use this word with distaste- 'debunked'.

Then I went to the search engine MetaGer and promptly found the information I was looking for, without any censorship. Quick stats:
>Adverse Reactions from Covid vaccines- Dec. 2020- Present: 1,490,160
>Adverse Reactions from All Other vaccines- 1990- Present: 913,497

>Number of Deaths: Covd vaccines- Dec. 2020- Present: 33,334
>Number of Deaths: All Other vaccines- 1990- Present: 10,071

Seems to me the numbers speak for themselves. At the very least they shout: "Hey...anyone with a modicum of curiosity, please come look at this."

I can clearly see why Google and the medical 'professionals' are so quick to pooh-pooh this and tell the world this is debunked. I'd say this: These stats are only for those that have been reported. How many young people have simply died- unexpectedly, suddenly, with no thought given to the vaccine?

I've had 3 of the shots. About a week after the third shot, while walking/jogging I had a serious and strong heart pain that came on, at first slowly. It would not cease and eventually had me stopped and sitting down on the sidewalk of a busy street. Anymore running at that time and I would have been done. Eventually the pain eased. I walked, very slowly, back home. It eased up. I felt better after about an hour. I went in to see my cardiologist and had tests. Everything seemed fine.

I'm in good shape. I keep active and work out regularly. Not hard, but decent for a guy my age. I play some sports. I move. I go to a cardio guy because of family history- nothing more. But...I've never felt pain like that before or since. Could have been anything, I guess. I asked my cardio doc bluntly about the possibility it was Moderna related. He kinda scoffed at that suggestion and blew it off. That was about 2 years ago now. I wonder what his opinion would be today.

Jefferson's Revenge said...

Here is what I know. In the past year I have personally known three 40 to 50 year olds with no apparent illness die “suddenly”. I can think of no similar occurrences in any other year.

As a very active 69 year old myself, 4 years ago I got my cholesterol down to 200 from 280 and my blood pressure down to 120 over 80 from 160 over 95. My resting heart rate is 40 to 45 bpm.

With all that good stuff going, within 9 months of the booster I had my first ever cardiac event, a heart attack. Last night I went to the ER for my first A Fib.

I also think of the extreme censorship 2-3 years ago placed on those who started to question the vaccine and side effects, like Dr. Campbell, mentioned above, and Berenson. At that time I thought that was an over the top reaction to basic questions and wondered about the cause of that overreaction. I think that the powers that be gradually became aware of what they had unleashed and forced people to do and the horror/fear caused them to keep digging that hole rather than go in a different direction. Human nature allows people to rationalize almost any behavior, especially around the “common good”.

I guess I am just a tinfoil hat conspiracy theory nut though. I wonder whether those public shots and boosters that our elite got in their cheerleading campaign were really the vaccine or just saline.



Left Bank of the Charles said...

‘Rasmussen downplayed the most significant discrepancy — there are 27% more Democrats who say they know someone who "might have died from vaccine side effects."’

What the Rasmussen story actually said:

“However, there is less political difference in the number who suspect someone they know might have died from vaccine side effects – 33% of Democrats and 26% of both Republicans and the unaffiliated.”

That’s a 7% difference, not a 27% difference. Yes, I see that 7% is 27% of 26%. If we play that game with the vaccination rate, we see that 35% more Democrats (85%) than Republicans (63%) got the vaccine. That suggests a correlation between getting the vaccine and experiencing the side effects with believing you might know someone who died from getting the vaccine.

Chris said...

Exactly how has the video been debunked? Or is it the commentator doesn't like what the video is about. Healthy people dying suddenly, and embalmers pulling huge clots out of them.

MikeR said...

I don't know anyone like that at all. But, on the flip side, for those who think that COVID turned out to be a normal flu:
I know two close friends who got sick with COVID, went to the hospital, and died. I know another two who were in respirators on the brink of death and survived.
I don't know anyone dying of flu, ever. That's because flu generally kills people who are dying, one more way to die in the ICU etc. The body is weakening and there are many ways for it to fail.
COVID was very different. It made people sick and killed them.
And I'd add, once the vaccine was out I don't know anyone who died of COVID either. Most of us completely stopped worrying about it, because (as a top doctor at Hopkins told us as soon as the vaccine was available), It will probably slow down transmission _some_, but the real point is that it is close to 100% effective in keeping people from getting very sick. And the variants that get around the virus were never that dangerous. Got my two shots and stopped worrying, no boosters.

Chris said...

No one. I mean NO one regrets NOT getting the MRNA vaccine.

Eddie said...

Black Americans are generally skeptical of the vaccines and may account for the unexpected results.

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

Glenn Reynolds sums it up perfectly:

"We’ve never had a vaccine-PR failure like this, and part of the public health community’s job is to sell treatments and preventives to the public. Instead they took a condescending, authoritarian, and frequently dishonest approach, and now people don’t trust them. Earning and keeping that trust is job number one for these folks, and instead they betrayed and squandered it. The costs will be lasting and severe. But hey, at least they’re not the only institution to betray and squander the public trust lately. So they’ve got that going for them, which is nice."

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Did Althouse’s headline disappear?

Roy Lofquist said...

Aristotle has perhaps taken note. It is really rather straight forward. Birds of a feather flock together. Republicans know more Republicans. Democrats know more Democrats. More Democrats received the vaccines than Republicans. More Democrats know of people they think died because of the vaccines. It's a trend.

Rory said...

If you vastly overestimated the threat from Covid, a few deaths from the vaccines would seem no biggie.

Ray - SoCal said...

85% of Democrats got the jab
65% Republicans got jabbed.

So it makes sense more Democrats would know somebody that died.

I regret getting the jab.

And the deliberate ban on early treatments using cheap generics that could have prevented the majority of Covid deaths is a crime.

I feel lied too.

The “documentary” died suddenly sounds like fear porn, and part of a campaign to discredit the idea of people actually dying suddenly by including some false information / disinformation. The producer is very sketchy.

I get a lot of credible information from various substacks.

And the censorship the government is doing on the subject is shocking, as well as deliberately not gathering the data on the issue.

If their are issues with the jab, why are so many organizations, especially health care requiring the jab plus boosters.

And the more boosters you get, the higher your chance of side effects.

A friend of a friend was laid off from his medical sales job, and is looking for a new job. Usually he should be a shoo in with his track record. Unfortunately every position requires the jab plus boosters, he was grandfathered in his old company. He is unvaxed. He is feeling a lot of pressure to get the jab. He is a single Father.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

What is this ‘general good’ the vaccine is supposedly providing?

It prevents extreme illness and hospitalization usually, the exact same benefit to taking HCQ prophylactically or Ivermectin as an early onset treatment. Exact same outcomes only the cheap prior-approved drugs were withheld by authorities and smeared by liars in order to herd us all into the experimental mRNA “vaccine.”

Heads should roll for the thousands of excess deaths caused by our Leaders. Lower per capita mortality in Mexico and India confirms this theory.

dbp said...

What if people who think somebody they know died from the jab are right? Or at least, right to the same extent, between Democrats and Republicans?

My eyeball-o-metric analysis of the numbers made me thing that Democrats vaccinated/Republicans vaccinated = Democrats who know someone died/Republicans who know someone died.

85/63
----- = 1.06
33/26

Personally, I don't think enough people have died from vaccination complications, for these percentages to hold-up, but "know" might be very expansive: Like, I heard that my cousin's wife's father died right after being vaccinated, etc.

On the other hand. Do side-effects cause more harm than benefit for healthy young people? To which I would answer: It's just as likely that there's a net benefit as it is that there's a net harm. We are looking at vanishingly small numbers of young healthy people who die from either covid or the vaccines.

Ann Althouse said...

"Healthy people dying suddenly, and embalmers pulling huge clots out of them."

Oh, come on. That's so easily debunked you're making a show of not even trying to get it right.

Just googling your assertion... here.

Try harder. Like: at all.

Bruce Hayden said...

I am not a Democrat. Not even close. But I believe that I know 3 guys about my age (~70) who died from the “vaccines”. All very vigorous. One last summer, during a bike race. One still at work outdoors with the phone company. All with recent good bills of health from their doctors, with no evidence of heart issues, and suddenly dying from heart attacks. And I know one guy, a PhD at Las Alamos, who is almost assuredly permanently disabled by vaccine induced heart issues. He had a negative reaction to the 2nd Jab. Requested a waiver for the 3rd Jab as a result. Denied. Right after that Jab, his heart blew up to almost twice it’s former size. Requested a waiver for the 4th Jab. Denied. He sued, and that requirement is on hold pending outcome of the suit.

Vaccine deaths have not been debunked. Not even close. This is just Dem talking points. It’s their way of attacking realities that they don’t want to address. No different than all the other conspiracy theories that they want to kill, such as Crooked Hillary wasn’t behind the Russian collaboration with Trump claim in 2016, that Biden legitimately won in 2020, as well as at least 3 Senators, given them control of the Senate, or, very likely, that they did the same this year (they again stole at least 3 Senate seat, plus the top slots here in AZ). They just say that these things have been debunked, because they don’t want to address them, because that would make the Democrats at the top look like the egregious cheaters and liars that they are.

reader said...

It seems as though the majority of people being protected are the elderly with multiple comorbidities and the people that appear to be at risk from the vaccine are otherwise healthy 20 to 35 year old males. Is that logical? Is it that they’re men, so screw them? Who needs the next generation?

I’m the mother of an otherwise healthy 25 year old male. I don’t think it’s logical. I also told my father-in-law that even though I was willing to make some sacrifices for his protection my son wasn’t one of them. Push comes to shove, that his grandson comes first.

My son has had the first shot, the second shot that then became part of the first dose, and the first booster. As I understand it he is done being willingly boostered. So no more for him unless his employment makes it mandatory.

reader said...

It seems as though the majority of people being protected are the elderly with multiple comorbidities and the people that appear to be at risk from the vaccine are otherwise healthy 20 to 35 year old males. Is that logical? Is it that they’re men, so screw them? Who needs the next generation?

I’m the mother of an otherwise healthy 25 year old male. I don’t think it’s logical. I also told my father-in-law that even though I was willing to make some sacrifices for his protection my son wasn’t one of them. Push comes to shove, that his grandson comes first.

My son has had the first shot, the second shot that then became part of the first dose, and the first booster. As I understand it he is done being willingly boostered. So no more for him unless his employment makes it mandatory.

Achilles said...

Just had a football player collapse in a game and they suspended the game.

He had a heart attack on field after making a tackle.

Myocarditis and Periocarditis have a 3 to 10 year window of mortality. We are going to go from 1 in 10000 to 1 in 1000 to 1 in 500 over the next few years.

Just like the attacks on agriculture and the attacks on energy the goal was to reduce the human population and to reduce the overall quality and length of life.

This is going to get nasty. The Oligarchs are really pulling out all of the stops and the backlash will not be kind.

BillieBob Thorton said...

I'm not vaccinated for the covid and I've not had covid so I'm part of the control group.
A good friend just died of a massive stroke after getting her third booster. There is no way of knowing if the booster caused the stroke but it does seem suspicious.

William50 said...

This is a little lengthy but well worth the time.

IgG4-related disease (IgG4RD) means FIBROSIS and organ destruction
That leads to death, eventually...To reiterate from my last Substack article, the authors found a 48,075% increase (from 0.04% - 19.27%) in spike-specific IgG4 antibodies in test subjects between the 2nd and 3rd injections of the Comirnaty product, so I suppose this would translate to a presence of IgG4 in the blood at levels higher than 1-3%. Probably closer to 20%? In any case, the shift in IgG subclass ratios is notable following the 2nd and 3rd injections.

traditionalguy said...

Maybe the reason is the false use of the word “vaccine”. Any sentient person now knows that the DNA alteration shot never was a vaccine. It was at best an untested experiment that produced no anti bodies. The Johnson and Johnson vaccine is and was the ONLY vaccine. And that vaccine was slandered daily by the media warning us that it was a very dangerous one.

Frankly, after the CDC and Fauci Gang was caught lying about nearly everything they said, maybe it’s too late for those guys to lie their way out of the strange new blood clots that are suddenly killing off healthy athletes.

Robert Cook said...

I'm not surprised in the least that Trump followers disregard COVID-19 as "just a cold" from which few people have died--despite the stats that show tremendous death numbers--while jumping to (and passionately embracing) the fiction that the COVID vaccines are killing great swaths of people. Trump worshipers are prone to believing shit that isn't so and disbelieving shit that is so...if it buttresses their fantasy beliefs and prejudices.

In general, I don't feel bothered to engage with such benighted folk or even to pay attention to their nonsense. I'm just observing here that they are staying true to their Bizarro World worldview.

Sebastian said...

"what's important is for everyone to do their part and contribute to the general good by getting the vaccine as prescribed"

Right. And of course that attitude, like all PC positions, gets continually reinforced within the prog bubble. And it is a tight bubble: to my knowledge, my lefty friends and acquaintances never read or hear anything outside the NYT/NPR/PBS/old Twitter MSM, and what they know of "the right," apart from an occasional skeptical remark by me and perhaps an occasional Douthat column, is entirely filtered.

Bruce Hayden said...

Ann - one social warrior type embalmer (from his resume and his prior work) with a BS degree in Natural Science and Psychology (and a MA in something else) with 11 years experience (presumably currently part time, since the MA is in a different subject - possibly so that he can teach. It makes a data point. He appears to have only practiced for 4 years embalming as an embalmer, before switching to teaching it. If his paper were on any other subject, or come to different conclusions, his lack of credentials would very likely have prevented publication. No BS in Bio, Chem, or Physiology. No MS, PhD, or MD. Etc.

The test that he would have needed to have done, and indeed, the missing test for those asserting strange clots too, is for spike proteins generated by the vaccines. There shouldn’t be any. But then, the FDA didn’t require the CDC mandated “shed” tests that they should have, that seem to have shown the presence of those vaccine generated spike proteins months after injections of the vaccinations.

CStanley said...

Anyone who thinks there are no "legitimate reasons to be concerned about the safety of COVID-19 vaccine” is an idiot. Anyone who thinks that about ANY new pharmaceutical is ignorant, and the specific circumstances of a new med technology used on a product rushed to market with waivers for liability? Massive reasons for at least an honest skepticism.

The terrible thing is that we’ll never really know because information is being suppressed. I certainly feel there’s enough circumstantial evidence to tip the scales away from ever getting another booster. The risk benefit started tipping away when it became clear that the vaccine didn’t protect against illness or spread (the latter being the reason I took the first two shots, wanting to protect my elderly mother.) And vaccinating children is malpractice, full stop. Prior to this, no doctor would ever have considered vaccinating children when the incidence of adverse effect was so much higher than the risk from the disease itself.

cfs said...

"Healthy people dying suddenly, and embalmers pulling huge clots out of them."

AA responded: "Oh, come on. That's so easily debunked you're making a show of not even trying to get it right."

So are the embalmers who are saying they are pulling huge clots out of the deceased lying for some reason? Or, are these people who are really not embalmers at all making videos and statements regarding these supposed clots while just pretending they are embalmers?

Left Bank of the Charles said...

A mini-controversy has developed over the months-long betting on whether Dr. Fauci would step down before the end of 2022.

PredictIt headlined the bet as “Will Anthony Fauci remain NIAID director through the end of the year?” but worded the rules as follows: “This market shall resolve to Yes in the event that Dr. Anthony Fauci holds the office of Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases without interruption until the End Date listed below. … End Date: 12/31/22 11:59 PM (ET)”.

December 31 has been reported as Fauci’s last day, but the question now is just when did his tenure end, at the end of the day or sometime during the day? Fauci haters, it appears you can still get into this bet at 21 cents on the dollar. That’s an opportunity to quintuple your money.

Maynard said...

There is no drug or vaccine or pseudo-vaccine that is completely 100% safe. When you inject millions of people (under threat of losing their livelihood) you are going to have a lot of people with seriously adverse side effects.

If 500 million people are vaxxed with a 99% safe vaccine, that leaves 5 million people with adverse effects.

Assistant Village Idiot said...

Ann's commenters are usually an irascible, but generally intelligent bunch. But the online conservatives, including here, have gone completely lunatic over covid and the vaccines. They strain at gnats and swallow camels. In saying they reject "experts" (always in quotes) about the "jab" (a dead giveaway term that the person has stopped hearing) they seem to suddenly find other experts to believe. The supposed skeptics - an abuse of that term, BTW - have been ten times as deceitful and crazy as the authorities. And the latter haven't been great.

It pays to listen to the people who have skin in the game. Not the medical personnel who are in other specialties but can talk pretty, but the ones in urgent care, ICU, emergency rooms. Nursing home administrators who get the reports of whole buildings suddenly having people go down because of improper safety precautions. And you all know some of those people, or should. Ask them.

Oh, the vaccine didn't work as well against new variants, especially WRT to transmission, and you actually f-in' think that is significant in terms of whether they do any good at all? No hope for you. You can't listen.

Wince said...

"Although, as you can see, there were some side effects."

Assistant Village Idiot said...

@cfs - some embalmers are already convinced that ssomething is up for entirely political reasons and are misinterpreting rather average data taking place in front of them. A well-known phenomenon, happens all the time. Gee, have you noticed that ever since Politician X mentioned anti-Asian prejudice there have been a lot more Asians coming into the supermarket? I wonder what is happening.

You could have figured that possibility out on your own but you chose not to. For exactly the reason I just described: you want something else to be true.

Beasts of England said...

‘Trump worshipers are prone to believing shit that isn't so and disbelieving shit that is so...if it buttresses their fantasy beliefs and prejudices.’

Says the dude who believes in socialism. lol

Anthony said...

I'm 60 and got the two Moderna jabs in mid-2021, nothing so far in terms of adverse events or complications.

I'm not getting anymore though. I'm not sure 'regret' is the right word, but I would have been okay not getting it. Either way, I work (remotely) (REMOTELY!!!!! 100% of the time) at a Major University and was required to provide proof of the jabs as a requirement for continued employment.

None of this was about public health, it was all about control.

Assistant Village Idiot said...

Followup complaints: Yeah well, we've got six more easily-answered objections. What about THOSE, smart-ass, huh?

Not my first rodeo.

Bruce Hayden said...

Every time I hear about antibodies, I think of that PSA with one of the Bridges boys, with his guitar, telling us we need to keep our antibodies up, so get boosted. That’s just stupid. That’s not how vaccines work, or I should say, worked, before early 2021 when the FDA and Wikipedia definitions of “vaccines” were revised to include these experimental gene therapy products. Before then, vaccines were designed to teach the immune system memory that these virus parts indicated the presence of a pathogen, so that the body’s immune system could respond more quickly when encountered later. The goal was to make sure that the immune system could recognize pathogens more quickly, not to constantly churn out huge amounts of those virus specific antibodies constantly. Doing that for every virus we have encountered would be a huge waste of immune system resources. Except that is exactly what is happening with these experimental artificial mRNA gene therapy products (aka COVID-19 Vaccines), that continue generating spike proteins long after the immune system has been taught that they indicate the presence of a pathogen, sometimes for months. And squandering those resources is likely the cause of many of the second order vaccine complications, including resurgence of chronic viruses like the one causing Shingles, as well as some cancers. The immune system resources that used to be used to control these viruses and cancers have been redirected to fighting the spike proteins generated by the vaccines. The first order side effects appear to be the result of the immune system attacking cells containing the spike proteins, wherever the artificial mRNA generating them have migrated in the body from the relatively safe injection site.

Chris said...

AA - So you are saying that Embalmers that have noted this from around the WORLD are lying and sacrificing their reputation for what exactly? What do they have to gain vs what they have to lose which is everything.

Bob Boyd said...

"Never trust an embalmer or a man who doesn't drink blood." - Count Dracula

Gusty Winds said...

48% of Americans think there are reasons to be concerned about the vaccine. The 15% who are "unsure" are just afraid to voice their concern. Can you blame them??

Take those numbers and figure the 63% (48+15) dropped out of booster participation.

Quick Google:

Overall, about 228.8 million people, or 68.9% of the total U.S. population, have completed a primary series.* More than 44.2 million people, or 14.1% of the U.S. population ages 5 years and older, have received an updated (bivalent) booster dose

The survey says 37% say everyone else is buying into "conspiracy theories" but only 14.1% of the American population has taken any boosters. Some of them opted out as well.

That should tell us ALL something. 68.9% got the first two shots, only 14% received anything beyond that. Actions, not words, tell the story of what Americans have come to understand about mRNA shots.

If you have chosen not to participate in the boosters...consider yourself part of the conspiracy theory.

Ray - SoCal said...

Is Althouse trolling?

>Just googling your assertion... here.

Google is censoring Covid “misinformation”

As Twitter was doing.

Gusty Winds said...

When discussing COVID "vaccination" an opinion should be qualified with mRNA shot disclosure.

Level 1: My name is Gusty Winds, and I have taken ZERO mRNA shots. But I smoke cigarettes and drink a lot of beer. I'm actually feeling pretty good about my life choices.

Level 2: "My name is John Doe and I took the first two shots, but have taken none after that."

Level 3: "My name is Jane Doe and I took the first two shots, plus X number of boosters"

Level 4: "Not only have I taken every mRNA shot available to me in the last two years, I have also made sure my children have been given the mRNA shots and boosters, and I support mandates at my local public school for all children to receive mRNA shots regularly".

I don't believe for minute that all the politicians in those staged public vaccination events (Biden, Bush, Harris etc...) were actually getting injected with the vaccine.

Jefferson's Revenge said...

Assistant Vil Idiot said

"It pays to listen to the people who have skin in the game. Not the medical personnel who are in other specialties but can talk pretty, but the ones in urgent care, ICU, emergency rooms. Nursing home administrators who get the reports of whole buildings suddenly having people go down because of improper safety precautions. And you all know some of those people, or should. Ask them."

Brother I don't know what world you live in but in mine and my wife's (a nurse in a clinical setting), most of the on the line health care workers were the ones warning about the effects they saw of the vaccine. Why do you think they had to be threatened with firing if they didn't comply? If theER and hospital people thought it was great, why would the institution need to threaten them? After the first 3 months of the pandemic, most of the front line workers new this was BS, at least the ones I know.

As regards to nursing homes, no one is talking about the elderly so they don't apply to this discussion at all. But I would check with the nursing home people in NY, NJ and here in PA about all of the deaths there that came from actually sending the sick people back to the home from the hospital by state order.

Almost everything you have been told for 3 years has been a lie. Under the enormity of that and your continued belief in those lies.

Ampersand said...

The poll results are part of a long overdue recalibration of US consensus. We need to get the data that will give us a firm basis to address efficacy, risk, pseudo-emergency powers, optimum strategy for public health response, and the greedonomics of vax marketing.

Joe Smith said...

Where's Richard Dawson when you need him?

rehajm said...

Sorry…I’m stuck on the commenter that believes the correct usage of percentages is a manipulative ‘game’…

Curious George said...

I'm not an embalmer, but Althouse going to one site whose debunker prefaces his debunk with "While I deigned to watch more of the antivaccine “documentary” Died Suddenly than I had to" while chastising a commenter for not trying hard is laughable. I'll guess at best she skimmed this.

Ann Althouse said...

@Jefferson's Revenge

I deleted you comment because you put in a bunch of extra paragraph spaces. I don't allow that. You can space your paragraphs, but you can't add extra paragraph breaks -- like for "emphasis" or to symbolize the passage of time or some such thing. Get your own blog if you want to do "graphics."

GRW3 said...

Remember, "Conspiracy Theories" about COVID have, more often than not, turned out to be "Spoiler Alerts" (or maybe "Trigger Warnings" for the Faucites). The unusual number of deaths of young people, especially among athletes. The current football player issue could really feed this issue.

Achilles said...

News got out that insurance companies had to pay out massive increases in premiums related to death of their insured.

All cause mortality had a massive spike in 2021 in the 15-64 age group.

These people did not die of Covid because these age groups just didn't die from COVID.

And the news of this is obviously being censored by the regime.

The people that pushed the mandates and the people that run the drug companies are in for a reckoning.

The people who attacked Ivermectin and HCL+Erythromycin for political purposes are pieces of shit.

We will remember who you are and that you are incompatible with a free high trust society.

chuck said...

Reminds me of climate change, where every weather incident is cited as proof.

guitar joe said...

I remember when the AIDS epidemic hit in the 80s. My kids learned in college that actions taken then were homophobic. I tell them that there may be a small grain of truth in that, but the more logical explanation is that people just didn't know the extent of the disease, how transmissible it was, and so on. They erred on the side of caution. Same thing here. With Covid, both sides have politicized things to some extent, but I know many people who died early in the stages of the disease because they didn't get vaxxed, but also didn't take steps to avoid exposure. Some were older, some younger, none seemed to have issues that would have led to their death--no co-morbidity. Early caution, as I said. I did the vaccine and two boosters, but I am waiting for any further booster. I will say that when I reached 55, I decided that maybe it was a good idea to get the flu shot. Before that, I was spotty about it. Age is a co-morbidity factory, like it or not.

Derve Swanson said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Gusty Winds said...

Curious George said...Althouse going to one site whose debunker prefaces his debunk with "While I deigned to watch more of the antivaccine “documentary”

Ahh...beneath the dignity. Always a good one from Ivory Tower elite. I haven't watched it either. You don't need to to know the mRNA shots are poison, and the mandates and propaganda are all lies.

All you need to know is what people DID with their bodies and the shots. Booster participation is an action.

I suspect, many who still defend the "vaccine" have declined participation. That HAS to be true if only 14% of Americans have been boosted.

Every other arrogant word is full of shit. I wonder how many boosters the author of the linked debunker article has taken?

Remember if the answer is "none" you're officially not fully vaccinated.

Michael K said...

The recent report is interesting. 85% of people surveyed have NOT taken a booster. I include myself and my wife in that number.

RMc said...

As an old guy who has had three Moderna jabs AND Covid

Hey, me too!

Data is not the plural of anecdote.

Gusty Winds said...

Ask yourself this regarding your level of mRNA shot support:

Would you personally inject a dose of the Pfizer or Moderna mRNA shot into a child?

Soften it. Would you take your child or grandchild to Walgreens and let them inject it into them?

Soften it more. Would you stand by and watch a child get injected with mRNA?

I sure the fuck wouldn't. And don't give me "that's not my job" or "I'm not trained to give a shot" cop out.

It's a moral question that is answerable. Physicians and nurses have given up careers to answer NO to that question, let alone being part of this medical experiment themselves.

Think of all the weak ass evil people in the education establishment who want this mandated for all American school children. As long as somebody else administers the shots.

RMc said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Mattman26 said...

rhhardin, the 90 percent effectiveness figure for the then-extant strain was never really legit, so it's not a matter of "it was quite effective when designed, but couldn't handle the variants."

They gamed the tests in the first place by not counting Covid cases occurring between the first jab and some number of weeks after the second, thus getting around the inconvenient fact that lots of people seemed to contract Covid during that interval (i.e., in the short term, the jabs left you more vulnerable to getting it).

And the 90 percent figure also ignores (I suppose maybe because it wasn't known at the time) that the protection wanes rather dramatically after a relatively short interval.

Robert Cook said...

"Where's Richard Dawson when you need him?"

He was captured and returned to the Nazi prison camp with Col. Hogan and the rest. He's been put in charge of the camp's PRISONER FEUD games.

dbp said...

"That should tell us ALL something. 68.9% got the first two shots, only 14% received anything beyond that. Actions, not words, tell the story of what Americans have come to understand about mRNA shots.

If you have chosen not to participate in the boosters...consider yourself part of the conspiracy theory."

I am somewhat in agreement but a bit of additional context:

1. I think it's the case that one cannot get the bivalent booster unless you take the original, (and now useless) mRNA vaccines. So the denominator shouldn't be 100, it should be 68.9 and thus, about 20% of the eligible population has gotten the bivalent booster.

2. People have noticed that the current version of Covid isn't very dangerous compared to the original. This may be partly due to vaccinations and immunity gained by getting some version of Covid. But either way, the net benefit from a vaccine is less than it used to be.

Richard Aubrey said...

Houston Methodist lost, iirc, about 150 employees who refused the vax.
New York lost so many health care workers for the same reason that Hochul was contemplating calling up the Guard. Apparently had no idea what medically qualified Guardsmen do for their day jobs.

Has anybody seen interviews with these folks?

Yeah. Me either.

Keith said...

Maynard said...
There is no drug or vaccine or pseudo-vaccine that is completely 100% safe. When you inject millions of people (under threat of losing their livelihood) you are going to have a lot of people with seriously adverse side effects.

If 500 million people are vaxxed with a 99% safe vaccine, that leaves 5 million people with adverse effects.

...

I agree. However (I'm a practicing physician) if treatment for X is 99% safe and has a 1% risk of terrible consequences, you better make sure that X is >1% deadly. For the elderly and medically frail, Covid is/was a greater risk than the vaccine. For everyone else it was very clear early on that the risk of Covid was very small to the healthy and non-elderly. A rational person would have recommended taking care of the high risk population more aggressively and not trying experimental treatments on people at little risk of Covid. Which is, in fact, what rational people (eg Great Barrington Dec) did. But the government and big business made the opposite decision. Everyone is mandated to get the vaccine or else lose your job. Despite no evidence it prevents spread. No sporting games unless you can prove vaccination. Soldiers, police officers, and firefighters as well as nurses and doctors were fired for not receiving the vaccine despite no evidence it prevents transmission and so no evidence it will help stem the spread. Dr Wen (CNN?) said maybe we shouldn't let people travel who are unvaccinated. Now she changes her tune.

When the chips were down, no one in the government or big business or in fact medical journals acted rationally. It would now be rational not to trust those institutions going forward.

Keith said...

Blogger Assistant Village Idiot said...
Ann's commenters are usually an irascible, but generally intelligent bunch. But the online conservatives, including here, have gone completely lunatic over covid and the vaccines. They strain at gnats and swallow camels. In saying they reject "experts" (always in quotes) about the "jab" (a dead giveaway term that the person has stopped hearing) they seem to suddenly find other experts to believe. The supposed skeptics - an abuse of that term, BTW - have been ten times as deceitful and crazy as the authorities. And the latter haven't been great.

It pays to listen to the people who have skin in the game. Not the medical personnel who are in other specialties but can talk pretty, but the ones in urgent care, ICU, emergency rooms. Nursing home administrators who get the reports of whole buildings suddenly having people go down because of improper safety precautions. And you all know some of those people, or should. Ask them.

Oh, the vaccine didn't work as well against new variants, especially WRT to transmission, and you actually f-in' think that is significant in terms of whether they do any good at all? No hope for you. You can't listen.

1/3/23, 9:21 AM

...

Hi. In every decision we make, we weight risk vs benefit. Should you leave your house? If you don't you can't go to work and make money and pay for food. If you do, a car could hit you. You weigh risks and benefits and choose.

In this case the risks of the virus are very, very small if you are neither elderly nor medically frail. We've known this from let's say six months out, say Sept 2020. If you are elderly and/or frail the risks are greater though not black-death-horrible. Let's say at most 5% mortality.

What is the risk of the vaccine? The reality is it is a new technology and we have no idea what the long term effects are bec it has not existed long term. As soon as the vaccine was released however we were told it is safe by the mass media and government. That was always absurd. It was tested for a very short period of time (medically short) for a small number of people. You could say it seems to be safe in the short term. You can make NO comments as to long term safety as it had not been tested long term and even now has only been out for a year or two. So you could say the short term risks are low but the long term risks are literally unknown.

When you do your risk-benefit analysis if you are elderly and/or frail the virus may kill you. The short term vaccine risks are small, and you don't care about the long term risks bec you won't be alive in 20 y. So you get the vaccine.

If you are young and healthy you DON'T get the vaccine. The risk of the virus has always been near zero - not zero but pretty close. In fact the flu kills more school age kids than this virus. The short term risk of the vaccine we were told is minimal. That turned out to be false as there is a real risk of myocarditis in otherwise healthy boys and young men. The long term risk is literally unknown. It has never been tested long term. What about young women? What does it do to their eggs? When a young woman was a fetus she had all the eggs she was ever going to have. She does not make new eggs. So when she is ready to make babies, we will find out if the virus is a problem or not. But as of today we don't know the answer to that question. Will there be a generation of deformed babies? Probably not. But the honest answer is we don't know.

I've mentioned it before that I'm a practicing physician. From very early on we've known the risk-benefit decision as above. From very early on I recommended people at risk get vaccinated and young people absolutely do not unless they are at specific risk (eg brittle asthma or similar).

It seems to be foolish and irresponsible to do otherwise and any rational person should have come to the same conclusion.

traditionalguy said...

NB: you can take the real vaccine made by J&J and all the J&J boosters. It is not a DNA experiment with deadly side effects. Take J&J all you want. Only trouble is it’s been hard to find…wonder why. As usual all mistakes are being made in favor of an early death for world population. The DEPOPULATORS seem to have taken control over every decision. No oil and gas and no and scarce fertilizer by regulations and decrees accidentally means sky high inflation and then world famine working together together with the China/Gates crafted bio-weapon pandemics…wonder why.

We don’t need to fear death by wars. We need to fear death by our evil rulers who follow Robert Malthus who wanted the government to kill off all the surplus people. That is all the people but the select European Royal lines and his super rich friends. Of course that none sense came from the mind of an Anglican priest. And the horrible deaths of millions of peasants in the Irish potato famine was a perfect proof of theory for these Evil Malthusians aristocrats. They are back again. Eliminating the supply of cheap food is their goal…wonder why.

n.n said...

Aside from excess deaths in Planned Parent/hood (e.g. Michigan, New York), masks to appease the cargo cult, social distancing at least one meter short of the minimum consensus, mandated forward-looking collateral damage, denied effective, inexpensive, safe therapeutic treatments, with less than 1% conditional risk of a progressive condition, there is a greater risk of adverse events from the vaxxxines (i.e. non-sterilizing, viral-vector treatments) in the general population.

Keith said...

Blogger Robert Cook said...
I'm not surprised in the least that Trump followers disregard COVID-19 as "just a cold" from which few people have died--despite the stats that show tremendous death numbers--while jumping to (and passionately embracing) the fiction that the COVID vaccines are killing great swaths of people. Trump worshipers are prone to believing shit that isn't so and disbelieving shit that is so...if it buttresses their fantasy beliefs and prejudices.

In general, I don't feel bothered to engage with such benighted folk or even to pay attention to their nonsense. I'm just observing here that they are staying true to their Bizarro World worldview.

1/3/23, 8:50 AM

...

Hi Robert. From the beginning we saw that people were counted as Covid deaths if they met one of two criteria - and I've seen several dept's of health from different states giving press conferences on this - 1) Test positive for Covid, 2) Test negative for Covid but have flu-like symptoms and a positive contact. Motor vehicle accident? If you tested positive you are a covid death. Suicide? If you tested positive you are a covid death. Stage four cancer? If you tested positive you are a covid death.

So the numbers we've all seen are NOT measuring how many people from covid. They are measuring of everyone who died, how many do we classify as having Covid at the time of death. We were explicitly told by the depts of health that it is not feasible to tease out who realistically died from covid (eg otherwise healthy 30Y from pneumonia) and who did not (90Y diabetic smoker from heart attack).

Which means of course there are no numbers to tell us reliably how many did covid kill.

The hospitals were clearly motivated to maximize covid stats as their reimbursement increased dramatically for covid cases. IIRC hospital admission for covid pneumonia vs non-covid pneumonia was something like 3-4x. Intubating a patient for covid was something like 25K which is outrageous.

The bottom line is Covid absolutely killed some young healthy people and absolutely killed old sick people who were already dying. How many did it actually kill? No one knows. The data were corrupted from the beginning.

Measuring excess deaths is useless as how many are from Covid and how many from govt intervention? Everyone agrees suicide, depression, substance abuse were way up and everyone agrees early treatable problems were delayed resulting in difficult to treat problems - heart attacks, cancer, appendicitis - and certainly killed many. Not Covid but the govt reaction to covid. So how many excess deaths are from covid and how many from the govt response? Hard to tease out.

What would be interesting to me is - knowing it is generally benign in young healthy people - look at excess deaths in 0-30Y, 30-60Y, and > 60. Presumably 0-30 is nearly all bec of govt response. It might be not unreasonable to think >60 excess death is mostly covid (but might be govt response), and then 30-60 in between. I'd be most interested in 0-30 or 0-40 excess death as that is most likely to be from govt response to covid.

iowan2 said...

6 months ago my GP never encouraged me to get the booster. I had the 2 shot initial dose, and one buster spring 2022 in order to keep working my consultant job.
My GP or her nursing staff had yet to get their booster. Next week I'll take into consideration the GP's recommendations, but I'm leaning no.
Despite being mid 60's and overweight, I have had covid twice. The first time 12/21 was nothing, not even a fever. The second time was my normal yearly cold. Two days ramp up, 3 days of symptoms, and then a couple days of breaking up.
Despite racking up a high co-morbidity score, I have a very good immune system.

I didn't have a problem with the shots as long as it lessened the symptoms and kept me out of the hospital and alive. But I don't see that now. The risk is too high. I don't know the right answer, but I do know the govt has lied every step of the way. I just assume they are lying about the dangers of the shot.

Jim at said...

Not the medical personnel who are in other specialties but can talk pretty, but the ones in urgent care, ICU, emergency rooms.

You mean the ones who were fired because they didn't get the jab? The ones on the front line who know what's going on?

Or are they lunatics, too?

Jupiter said...

"The political breakdown is interesting ..."

Yeah, it will be.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Tina Trent said...

Two weeks after I took my first Moderns shot, my quarterly bloodwork went haywire for the first time, after years of no such markers. They had to double my blood pressure meds; my red blood cells were shaped wrong; my white blood cell count plummeted, and I now have an oncologist. Who told me not to take any more boosters and said she had been seeing new atypical patients and strange charts like mine. Two years later the bloodwork has very slowly improved with no medical intervention. At least there are some honest doctors. I had no prior condition affecting my blood cells and no such issues in my family. Meanwhile, anyone who thinks the FDA, CDC, NIH and NIAID are functioning transparently, not pressuring doctors to shut up, not lying about their role in funding this pandemic, focusing appropriate research to these drugs, or doing more science than politics at the top are ignorant of how bureaucratic careerism has warped the scientific protocols of epidemiology. It started with AIDS and has gone downhill ever since, as have medical research departments in universities. We need to hybridize some of our medical research to models more like France's and Israel's and clean up our ossified and politicized institutions.

There are a lot of people on this thread who are utterly ignorant of the radicalism of the departures made from normal responses to such a crisis. Had we been able to ask questions (and had the media done its job), we would likely have more answers now. If that alone doesn't scare the shit out of you, you aren't paying attention.

Kirk Parker said...

Keith's is a welcome voice of (detailed) sanity. I would only add, regarding his statement:

"We've known this from let's say six months out, say Sept 2020"

that he's being overly cautious with his dating. We've known--of at least very strongly suspected -- that the virus was not dangerous to the young and healthy ever since the Diamond Princess. That's way back in Feb 2020, or you could say March by the time the results there were widely known.