Covid vaccines - thread banned users in First Post

I have said before that VAERS is used as a safety signal. What I'd like to know is why this very alarming safety signal is being ignored.

I agree this. I get that VAERS comes with a warning that not a reported is not proof of causality, but it's whole purpose is to act as an early warning alarm. i.e if an inordinately high number of adverse reactions were happening alarm vaccinations would get halted under the precautionary principle.

This does not seem to be happening, just a general nothing to see here reaction, repeated ad nauseam by fact checkers who now seem to be an authority on pharmacovigilance.

According to the CDC just over 3.1 billion doses of flu vaccines have been administered since 1990 in the US.

A VAERS search for deaths reported as an adverse reaction of all influenza vaccines lists 1295 reports since 1990.

There have been about 600m doses of Covid vaccines administered since 2020 in the US.

A VAERS search for deaths reported as an adverse reaction of Covid vaccines lists 13,604 reports since 2020.

In my opinion, this is a red flag. Why should so many more deaths per Covid vaccine be reported than flu vaccine?

Fair enough, it is not being ignored, it's being dismissed as nothing to see here.

How by pointing out the difference between the reports of deaths from the flu vaccine and those of the Covid vaccine is this a misuse and abuse of VAERS data?

Surely that is the whole point of VAERS data? Asking why the death report rate for a new vaccine released under emergency use might be higher than anything that has gone before it?

I totally get that the reporting rate is likely to be higher than non EUA vaccines. It does also seem to be significantly higher than previous vaccines with EUA approval.

86.34% of all death reports from any vaccine for any illness reported to VAERS since 1990 were from COVID-19 vaccines.

That is the data. Saying that this seems to be extraordinarily high is not a misuse of the data.

The study in the Lancet that generated the "Covid vaccines not linked to deaths, major US study finds" headline in the article linked above noted that the 3663 reports of death without a death certificate or autopsy - i,e most of them - "causes of death were most commonly unknown or unclear", which really does not rule out the vaccines as far as I can see.

It has already been explained to you multiple times why the numbers reported for Covid vaccines are not comparable with other vaccines. There are different reporting protocols.

And I've acknowledged this. The unique circumstances of the Covid vaccines undoubtedly caused an increase in reporting to VAERS, not just for deaths but everything else, like somebody getting cramps in their legs. My point is that looking at the reports of deaths alone, the figures are way off the charts compared to anything in history. That is not a misrepresentation.

On the VAERS homepage there is a link to more information on Post-licensure vaccine safety monitoring using VAERS, a very comprehensive document authored in 2015 addressing all the strengths and weaknesses of the VAERS system, including that of "stimulated reporting" - i.e increased public awareness of a vaccination campaign will lead to increased reporting from all quarters, including the general public.

However it also points out:

Death, unsurprisingly is considered serious and unexpected. It is possible to search VAERS for all the foreign reports from all vaccines from 1990 - 2022.

As far as foreign reports are concerned the reporting protocol was no different. Vaccine manufacturers were obliged by law to submit reports of deaths as part of the post licensing monitoring requirements, irrespective of whether the drug was EUA or not.

Covid vaccines account for 79.29% of all foreign source reports of deaths from any vaccine since 1990. That seems remarkably high.

You haven't shown that the number of US produced vaccines used outside the US for covid was comparable with non covid vaccines.

As I understand it this makes no difference. VAERS logs reports of deaths of all vaccines available in the US, irrespective of country of manufacture. A domestic report is a death on US soil, a foreign report is a death outside the US. If the vaccine is available in the US the manufacturer is obliged to report it.

You haven't shown that the reports were done on the same basis as per the increased awareness disclaimer. For example, is there a spike in reports for 'new vaccines', if so all things being equal a new vaccine rolled out in large numbers will generate more reports.

A death is a death irrespective of whether the vaccine is new or not. And the manufacturers are obliged to report deaths irrespective of whether the vaccine is new or not.

You haven't shown that the age distribution of the vaccines were the same. Are you comparing covid vaccines in high use in older demographics with vaccines in high use in children?

The figures are for all vaccines administered in the last 30 years. Undoubtedly there will be differences in age profiles between the different individual vaccines.

elevated reporting that might occur in response to intense media attention and increased public awareness

Intense media attention and increased public awareness leads unsurprisingly to elevated domestic reporting, particularly from the general public.

It makes no difference to the reports that the manufacturers are required to submit by the law, irrespective of the headlines. Hence why I quoted the figures for foreign reports. These are the reports that over 99% are submitted by manufacturers as part of their obligations to comply with licensing requirements.

And you accept that the age profile of the vaccines distributed may be significantly different. Therefore you are not comparing like with like, unless you somehow expect there to be the same number of incidental deaths in 80 years olds as 8 or 28 year olds.

No, of course not. That would be ridiculous. Just as I wouldn't expect the same number of Covid deaths in 8 year olds or 28 year olds as 80 year olds.

Unsurprising that when proven factually wrong on all else

You seem to have forgotten I have not been proven factually wrong on the point that the regulators said the estimates of efficacy against severity were unreliable due to limited data.

Unless you're referring to something else?

When asked why the experts find no issue, offer no explanation.

The only person who asked me that question was KIngMob, who I ignore for the good of the thread.

But to respond to you on that point, that's exactly what I find puzzling, which is what I said in one of my first points on the VAERS data.

At the very least, in the interests of public confidence in vaccines, why are the experts not detailing and explaining the fact that the numbers of death reports in VAERS are colossal - over 86% of the total - compared to other vaccines and offering detailed explanations of why this is so? The general response seems to be focusing on you can't use VAERS to prove causality so there is nothing to see here.

86% of all death reports since 1990 does seem to be an awful lot to be in line with expectations. If this is true then it would suggest VAERS has hitherto been woefully inadequate as an early warning signal, because the extent of the underreporting has been colossal.

The only explanation I can offer is when doctors and experts are rightly worried about being reprimanded or discredited as anti-vaxxers, they are inclined to say nothing at all.