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 has nothing to do with my argument. I see anti-vaxxers making false and misleading claims, distorting studies, and misinterpreting statistics. Thus the title: Please learn math. If you're refusing to get vaccinated so you can stick it the man, more power to you. I respect that. Just don't misrepresent statistics in embarrassingly false ways to do it. Stand up and say: I refuse to take the vaccine for moral, political, whatever reasons. That makes sense.
Since you keep ignoring my question on which vaccine research you trust, I’m just going to interject here. Stop using the term “anti-vaxxer”. Or I will just sling a term back at you: “science denier”. That’s you. You don’t understand math, immunity, virology, evolution, the list goes on.
Vaccines aren’t science and they don’t work. If they did, they’d be 100% effective and you could force/manipulate/encourage people into taking them because, you know, there would be irrefutable proof of their usefulness. But you can’t because they aren’t scientifically effective and that doesn’t even take into account all of the adverse injuries and death associated with vaccines. Unless you can point me to a study that shows vaccinated people aren’t getting sick from COVID, the seasonal flu, polio, etc. But you can’t because those vaccines don’t work either. In fact, they prolong these illnesses. Look at the explosion of polio in Africa, the increased rates of autism after MMR vaccines.
What do you understand about the immune system? Herd immunity? When viruses mutate, if you believe in germ theory, they become less deadly and more communicable. Our immune response then creates anti-bodies for that virus and the cycle continues, as it has for millennia. So why force people into ineffective vaccines when nature runs its course and eliminates the threat. You have to trust your body’s immune response, or does the immune system no longer exist?
I don’t think you fully comprehend what’s even in COVID vaccines. Since you’re a mathematician, are you denying that VAERS, and these studies showing increased rates of hospitalizations and death associated with vaccinated people? Do you deny Pfizer’s own trial papers that are releasing showing people died and were injured during their trials? Do you refute the 9 pages of side effects associated with COVID experimental injections? If you’re denying it, what’s your proof that the vaccines work? That the numbers you refute are false? That trial research from the vaccine makers themselves is wrong? You can pick and choose numbers here and there and yell “anti-vaxxer!!” but you’re a science denier.
I’ve known loads of vax shills such as yourself over the years. You all resort to falsehoods, name calling, seething with a little side of cope. You’re a pawn, a mouthpiece for the billion dollar companies that love useful idiots such as yourself.
Source: I’ve never been vaccinated and, miraculously, I’m still alive.
I just scrolled through all the replies I've received and I don't see any others from you. I haven't ignored your question.
I literally cite the science on this. Here is a study from one of the top medical journals in the world:
Covid-19 Vaccine Effectiveness against the Omicron (B.1.1.529) Variant
You will immediately gainsay this scientific study (just watch) published in a top science journal, recognized by top scientists all over the world, but then call me the "science denier." That's truly, truly Orwellian, dude.
Literally an unsupported claim hurled in utter desperation to protect your cherished biases.
Hmmm....in addition to the New England Journal of Medicine article above, let's see what else we can find on this, shall we?
Here is a 1965 British Medicine Journal study on the pertussis vaccine, which as is noted in the discussion:
You aren't a science denier, right? But...right...you will absolutely deny this science.
JAMA, another top journal published the research on the effectiveness of polio vaccines, but unfortunately that's behind a paywall. But it's there if you want to buy it.
Here's an article on measles vaccines:
Effectiveness of measles vaccination and vitamin A treatment
Which states:
All this readily found on the internet (google scholar works well). But you aren't an "anti-vaxxer," right? You understand all this science-y stuff better than even the scientists, I guess.
So saying "vaccines aren't science and they don't work" isn't being an anti-vaxxer? It isn't being anti-science when peer reviewed science journals have published hundred, thousands of studies on the effectiveness of vaccines.
Back to not understanding math. Every damn time. Look, the idea is to reduce the contagion rate to below 1, so the number of infected people decreases instead of increases. So a vaccine doesn't have to be 100% effective to protect the community. That doesn't mean nobody will be infected, but it does mean fewer and fewer people will be infected. Which is better than just letting everybody get infected. (don't start on "herd immunity," I guarantee you will misrepresent that concept as well).
Can you cite a scientific study on "adverse injuries and death associated with vaccines?"
I found this study straight away:
Vaccine Adverse Events: Separating Myth from Reality
That article says this:
No mention of "deaths associated with vaccines." I did notice you used the term "associated with" giving you wiggle room because you know there's no causal relationship.
Vaccines virtually eradicated polio in the US. Again, you're making many claims. Where are the peer reviewed studies supporting your claims? It's just a lot of words strung together unless you have scientific evidence. (A polio outbreak in Africa is not evidence of the ineffectiveness of vaccines.)
oop. There it is. Herd immunity. I'm pretty sure you have no clue what herd immunity is. Here's some science to help you:
Herd immunity is an important—and often misunderstood—public health phenomenon
National Academy of SCIENCE. You aren't going to deny more science are you?
What studies? If these studies exist, why don't you explicitly cite them? I bet because they aren't science. I can say without even reading them that they aren't science, because scientists wouldn't use VAERS to establish any causal links between vaccines and vaccine injuries. How do I know that? Because VAERS itself says the data on that site isn't suitable for that purpose:
More from VAERS site itself:
From page, Guide to Interpreting VAERS data:
[emphasis in original.]
So tell me more about studies based on VAERS data. Seriously, if you didn't know this about VAERS already, then you are just ignorant about the science related to vaccines. If you did know this about VAERS, then you're a liar. No respectable scientist would ever base a conclusion of causation on VAERS data. So if you have accepted studies based on VAERS data, you've been duped by liars.
Now that you know this, you can stop citing VAERS data. Because to continue to cite VAERS data when VAERS itself says not to, is dishonest. And you don't want to be dishonest, do you?
Did you really think I would fall for these anti-vaxxer talking points? Come on. This stuff only works on red pilled, down the rabbit hole crowd.
You need a citation. I can't deny or not deny if I can't read the trial papers.
I know there's side effects. I've been injected 3 times, so I know by experience. Please link to your sources (as I have done).
I'm inclined to respond with the thought-killer: "do your own research" from the anti-vaxxer crowd. But I won't. I will help you get a start on that research.
Covid-19 Vaccine Effectiveness against the Omicron (B.1.1.529) Variant
Effectiveness of Covid-19 Vaccines against the B.1.617.2 (Delta) Variant
Effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines: findings from real world studies
Effectiveness of mRNA and ChAdOx1 COVID-19 vaccines against symptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection and severe outcomes with variants of concern in Ontario
Note on above; this is a preview copy and didn't go through peer review and says so up front in bold letters which is what hones publishers would do.
Real-world effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines: a literature review and meta-analysis
Effectiveness of Covid-19 Vaccines in Ambulatory and Inpatient Care Settings
Effectiveness of Covid-19 Vaccines over a 9-Month Period in North Carolina
Effectiveness of COVID-19 mRNA Vaccines Against COVID-19–Associated Hospitalization — Five Veterans Affairs Medical Centers, United States, February 1–August 6, 2021
Effectiveness of COVID-19 Vaccines in Preventing Hospitalization Among Adults Aged ≥65 Years — COVID-NET, 13 States, February–April 2021
Effectiveness of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna Vaccines Against COVID-19 Among Hospitalized Adults Aged ≥65 Years — United States, January–March 2021
Efficacy and effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 infection: interim results of a living systematic review, 1 January to 14 May 2021
Effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines against symptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection and severe outcomes with variants of concern in Ontario
Effectiveness of COVID-19 Vaccines against Delta (B.1.617.2) Variant: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Clinical Studies
Comparative Effectiveness of Moderna, Pfizer-BioNTech, and Janssen (Johnson & Johnson) Vaccines in Preventing COVID-19 Hospitalizations Among Adults Without Immunocompromising Conditions — United States, March–August 2021
Effectiveness of 2-Dose Vaccination with mRNA COVID-19 Vaccines Against COVID-19–Associated Hospitalizations Among Immunocompromised Adults — Nine States, January–September 2021
This isn't even close to all the studies out there demonstrating the effectiveness of the vaccines. I've provided a nice sampling of the SCIENCE on this topic. I ACCEPT this science (thus I am not a science denier).
Here is start for you to do your own research on this topic:
https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C38&q=effectiveness+of+COVID+vaccines&btnG=
Now please provide me with your list of peer reviewed scientific studies that demonstrate that the vaccines are not effective or cause serious injury/death. PEER REVIEWED. I am not going to wade through pseudoscientific junk. I spent too much time doing your research for you here.
Show me a single paper that is done by an entlty that is not financed, connected, or dependend on BigPharma or state Health institutions. Show me a replication of a single paper that is done by an entlty that is not financed, connected, or dependend on BigPharma or state Health institutions
You don't understand, that everything you linked here is a solid proof that all that vaccinehoax is not a science at all.
Scientific papers are published to present some research to other scientists. Presenting your research to other scientists is necessary for independent replication of researsch. If you have no independent replication of your research, publication of your research says absolutely nothing about validity of your research. Only when other scientists repeat your experiments and get exactly same results, your research could be named valid and your theory could be accounted as correct.
Science is not about publishing papers. It is about repeateability of experiment that prove or disprove some theory. Repeateability of experiment is the only proof that your research is valid. If nobody independently replicated your research and get the same results - it is unscientific to declare that your theory is correct.
There are no any single independent replication of any paper somehow connected with coronahoax at all. Medical "science" have lowest replication rate of published papers among all other areas. Moreover, even if rare medical papers replicated even by not-so-independent, but just another group of scientists, their results in most cases contradictes with initial paper. That is named "replication crisis", many sane people tried to point on this greatest problem in medicine, but was shut down by medical establishment. But with coronahoax we see a total zero of independent replications.
So, if you want to talk about science, you choose completely wrong area. Medicine is not a science for a long time already. There is only theories that is not supported by independent replication of experiments.
Published papers prove absolutely nothing if described experiments was not replicated by independent researchers with same result.
There is nothing to discuss at all. You have no any clue what science is and how it works. It is funny to see how you try to replace science with some kind of stupid religion with "published papers" as sacred writings and people financed by BigPharma and state health institutions as "priests", having no any idea what is all that really about.
You all keep making these claims, but I see nothing to back up the claim. I've cited dozens of papers in this thread. Why don't you go through and list the funding sources for each of them.
The funding source of a study alone doesn't discredit the study. The studies lay out their entire methodology so they can be replicated. Some of these papers have dozens of authors named on them. You have to believe that all of those authors, all of those research institutions, all of those journals are willing to bend the truth and risk their reputations by doing shoddy science.
State health departments? Seriously? Come on, of course state health departments are going to fund research on COVID, it's literally their job. You are literally ruling out all sources of funding.
Says anonymous internet troll "Crazy Russian."
You have no idea what you're talking about. Papers published in prestigious research journals undergo peer review. Experts in the field review the methodology and analysis before a paper is accepted for publication. If you think there's a problem with the study, then why aren't anti-vaxxer "scientists" replicating them and showing them to be false and publishing their results? They could do that. Instead, se see armchair experts poo pooing valid studies published in prestigious journals on the basis of nothing, just the possibility that there is some vast conspiracy including scientists, the top medical journals in the world, and top research institutions. All lying to get people to take vaccines. Literally, a bonkers position.
And what is the purpose of this grand conspiracy? What interest does the state have in getting people vaccinated other than preventing a pandemic that kills people and destroys the economy? You reject studies financed by the state, but the state has to pay for all these vaccines. It makes no sense at all.
I wonder if you cast the same critical eye at all studies supported by Big Oil? All those fake studies that purport to debunk global warming? You reject those, too, right?
Papers present finding of science.
Theories are not "declared" correct. That's not how science works. Every study either supports or doesn't support a hypothesis. It is absolutely scientific to declare that the study either did support or did not support a hypothesis.
How do you know that? Do you think all replicative studies are also published? They are not. What is your source for your claim that there's been no replication of the findings of any paper? There are literally hundreds, thousands of papers. Have you read them all to see if they support or don't support findings of previous papers? If not, then how can you make this claim?
So you only accept replication of studies done by independent groups of non-scientists? You are entwining yourself in an ideology so airtight that there is no way to refute it. You won't accept science because by the rules you set up, there is no way to prove things that don't confirm your bias. I doubt you are so critical when you accept studies based on data pulled from the VAERS website. Right? All these independent non-scientists cherry picking data from a site that literally disclaims that its data is likely to contain inaccuracies is the kind of science you can accept.
Not true. You have made this up. But papers do have to be replicable. So anti-vaxxer scientists can go out and disprove them. Why don't they?
So says anonymous internet troll "Crazy Russian." I'll take his word over the word of dozens of scientists publishing in the most prestigious medical journals in the world.
Why don't you start a "science-y" journal and publish your debunks of all these, hundreds and thousands of papers published in prestigious medical journals? You clearly know more about science than all of these scientists who actually have science jobs.
Zzzz. It’s the same thing every time with you vax whores.
You cite Big Pharma sponsored “research” and “studies” and wonder why people call you out on your presumptions.
If you can’t see what is happening around you, right now, with all cause mortality rising worldwide at the same time routine/scheduled vaccines are thrown at kids in amounts much higher from even 10 or 20 years ago, then your awesome “modern medicine” doesn’t make a whole lot of sense and it doesn’t work. Careful, don’t say all cause is up because of covid, that’s got a 99.9% survival rate. Hmm, what could be causing all this death?
Until next time. I look forward to your sad response to the fact that Big Pharma (BioNTech) is warning their investors about share prices tanking (which is really what all of this is about, it’s got nothing to do with health or “science”) because their trials were worthless and misrepresentative, and that their injections are neither safe nor effective. Now why would that happen? Better check their math and go get those boosters.
You don't like the term "anti-vaxxer" but "vax whores" is legitimate? Ok.
You are making a fallacious attack on these studies. Instead of dealing with the substance of these scientific studies, you discount them because of your assumption of sponsorship. First, I don't think you know for sure that all these studies are sponsored by "Big Pharma." Second, even if some or even all of them are, they still have to pass peer review to be published in a prestigious journal like JAMA or BMJ or NEJM, or any of these journals. So you have to believe in a widespread conspiracy composed of the most prestigious journals on earth as well as all these prestigious research institutions willing to go along with "Big Pharma" and publish false studies.
What you don't do is offer any substantive criticisms of the research. You just throw out a thought-killer, "Big Pharma," as your cognitive shield to defend your cherished presuppositions.
Let's see. Here's this article: Effectiveness of Covid-19 Vaccines against the B.1.617.2 (Delta) Variant
Who do you think sponsored this study?
Here are the disclosure forms . You will notice that one of the authors, not one of the main authors (authors are listed in order of contribution), has listed an unrelated Pfizer grant. Do your experts provide disclosure forms?
Source, please?
Ok. That's fine. You can not believe me. I don't care.
"Numberology?" You mean math and science? Yes, I respect math and science. I also respect principled stands, which is why when someone says they won't get the vaccine our of principle, I don't argue with them. That's fine. I disagree with them, but if they feel that out of principle against state mandates as infringement on their liberty, I'm not arguing against their position on that. The proof of that is in the pudding.
I'm fighting out here against misinformation. If someone says, "I won't take the vaccine because I won't be coerced or socially pressured," I don't care. That's an honest take.
But when people spread falsehoods that other people might believe, falsehoods based on lies, then, yes, I will fight that fight against falsehood, manipulation, and disinformation. It is dishonest and unethical to lie. I will fight against that.
I care about the truth. Further, it is a threat to the health of the community I live in, not to mention the health of people who are close to me and more at-risk of contracting severe, life-threatening infection.
What the hell are you even talking about? What "credentialed men" are you talking about. I cite credentialed men and even some women ALL THE TIME.
There are bunch here that I site:
Effectiveness of COVID vaccines
I haven't seen in any response to me a single "credentialed man" cited. The article I criticized was not by a "credentialed man," but an uncredentialed liar. I have no patience for uncredentialed liars.
Ummm....ok. I'm not sure you are actually sane. No, it's science, it's not a "cult ritual."
No, actually you don't. There was no statistical analyses done on those numbers. I am talking about math, straight up numbers. How many of these vs how many of those. Just math, yes math that used some very simple stats (like percentages), but no stats to determine causation or even correlation. So I think you don't know much about either math or statistics.
Everything does come down to math. The problem with statisticians is they don't rationalize the denominator. I just can't even go there.
Math is stupid? ok. That doesn't actually go against my position that anti-vaxxers don't understand math.
More utter nonsense. Not a single point worth arguing.
I agree with you on this point- there's a lot of bad references floating around. Though, there's also a LOT of bad policy and bad support for the vaccine. If our goal is to be objective then we need to condemn dogma where it exists.
Of course we should condemn dogma. I have yet to see where the support for the vaccine is "bad policy." You won't show your "math" and I have literally read hundreds of links that anti-vaxxers put up purporting to be "studies" showing the vaccines to be ineffective at best, harmful at worst. Of all those links, not one stands up to even the most cursory of examination.
Show me THE BEST study that demonstrates the ineffectiveness of the COVID vaccines. I will read it and consider it. But I am not an epidemiologist or a virologist. I doubt that you are either and when we have studies like this:
Covid-19 Vaccine Effectiveness against the Omicron (B.1.1.529) Variant
we should have substantial reasons for rejecting it. Not conspiracies about the "western medicine establishment" that won't sanctify drinking urine or eating placentas as sound preventative health practices because they want to sell more drugs to people. (And, yes, absolutely, many drugs are overprescribed, physicians get taken in by drug companies, too, yes, I'm not saying those problems don't exist.)
it is ludicrous to trust an anonymous person on the internet doing the math on vaccine efficacy over the work of experts in the field, openly publishing their work in prestigious journals for the whole world to see, consider, and critique.
I don't trust "experts" i trust experts
You mean you don't trust the actual experts who have studied their subjects for nearly a decade just to earn their PhDs then have secured prestigious research positions and publish their work in prestigious research journals where other "experts" working at other prestigious research institutions review their work prior to publication and either reject it or mark corrections to be made before the research is published in said presitigious journal?
No, your experts publish on blogs on the internet or made up anti-vax journals that are not held in high regard by the scientific community and are not reviewed by people who earned their PhDs after nearly a decade of higher education and do not work at prestigious research institutions. Those are your experts.
It's literally irrational. If I'm wrong, cite one of your experts. Cite yourself and provide the "math" you did on the effectiveness of vaccines. Don't give me studies based on VAERS, I have demonstrated already how and why using that data to make causal links between "vaccine injuries" and vaccines is entirely spurious and outright dishonest. So if your number are based on VAERS, be prepared to defend why you are using a database that itself says shouldn't be used for that purpose.
You keep saying I'm wrong and that all this research in all these prestigious scientific journals is wrong, but you have yet to cite a single study or even a single fact to support your position.