I continually see memes quoting statistics that claim to show the ineffectiveness of vaccines.
Anybody with even middle school level math competency should be able to see through the misrepresentation of these statistics.
A recent example stated that 85.7% of deaths over a particular week in Scotland were vaccinated people. The conclusion drawn was that the vaccines don't work because the vast majority of people dying were vaccinated.
What was left out in the post was that 94% of Scotland has received at least 1 dose and 74% has received 3 doses. That leaves only less than 6% of the population unvaxxed accounting for 12% of the deaths. This data suggests (suggests, doesn't prove anything), just the opposite of the conclusion drawn.
Misuse of statistics makes people look either stupid or dishonest. If you see something posted like this, you should immediately question your source. Anybody passing off this kind of stuff isn't vetting their sources or their numbers either through actual intent to mislead or sheer stupidity. Either way, the source cannot be trusted. Trusting such a source is just allowing yourself to be duped (which makes you a dupe) or a liar yourself.
Hold yourself to higher standards of integrity, please, everybody. It doesn't help anybody to lie about facts or pass on lies about facts.
This needs to adjust for prior odds over time or it's meaningless because, as you state elsewhere, the vaccine rate changes drastically over time. Need to find rolling cumulative average of a properly normalized series of odds. Last I did this vaccine was 5-6x more dangerous than doing nothing. The reason is because you can't just look at deaths, you most compare any outcome that is worse than the odds of doing nothing... ie. All serious negative adverse events.
You can look at deaths. If you are considering whether the vaccine prevents deaths, you look at deaths.
If you want to look at imaginary "vaccine injuries" maybe you have a point. Otherwise you don't. The OP was a direct response to a claim based on a single week that 99% of deaths were vaccinated people.
There are indeed many reasons to not just look at straight forward comparisons in order to determine vaccine effectiveness. But my OP was in a direct response to someone who was doing that exactly. And I used those numbers to show how that was completely spurious. So you agree with me: it's not a legitimate method for determining vaccine effectiveness.
Here is a study I will accept:
NEJM Covid-19 Vaccine Effectiveness against the Omicron (B.1.1.529) Variant
So you have literally the most damaging vaccine ever created as measured by VAERS and your solution is to dismiss all this evidence as imaginary? Like I said before, change the goalposts to fit the narrative so it seems
You do know that VAERS alone is a suitable database for drawing that conclusion right?
The VAERS website itself says on the first page:
Yet here you are, using VAERS in a way that it itself cautions against. Why do you believe its legitimate to do that?
On the page: Guide to Interpreting VAERS Data, it reads:
No cause-and-effect relationship established. Anybody can report to VAERS. On and on. To use any of the VAERS data to demonstrate a cause and effect relationship, you'd have to verify the veracity of the report, rule out other possible causes, etc, etc. All of which is impossible to do with VAERS alone.
Another disclaimer on the VAERS site reads:
You have to wade through a lot of warning about how to not interpret this data in order to go ahead and interpret the data in exactly the way the site itself warns against. I would say that's dishonest.
What exists that is better?