OT: What more do you need to say?

[Alan]

<https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/12/05/1059828993/data-vaccine-misinformation-trump-counties-covid-death-rate>

[-hh]

On Tuesday, December 7, 2021 at 1:02:35 PM UTC-5, Alan wrote:
>
> <https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/12/05/1059828993/data-vaccine-misinformation-trump-counties-covid-death-rate>

Unfortunately, its not too surprising to see the correlation between anti-vax/-science
and the Republican Right manifest itself in CoVid cases & CoVid mortality.

Case in point, an old friend volunteered the following comment. I'll
provide it twice ... first "as is":

[quote]
Dear Friends, I have heard some interesting explanations about why people
(like me) are hesitant to get the COVID vaccine, such as irrational fear or
selfish concern with freedom. I am responding with my reasons. There are
two. Number 1. Since all of the vaccines were developed using cells
obtained from aborted children AND the bodies of aborted children are
still sold for medical research, my acceptance of the vaccines would be
an acceptance of the continuation of that practice. I do not want to promote
abortion and do not believe that I have to sell out that principle in order to
save lives. Number 2. As a Catholic, I believe in free and informed consent
regarding health care. This principle exists because individuals have an
obligation to make responsible decisions regarding health care and cannot
do so if they are not free from coercion or do not have access to the necessary
information. Besides the stories of serious harm passed on to me from friends
in the medical industry, as well as many other news stories of serious injury,
the information necessary for me or my doctor to make a responsible decision
regarding the vaccines--such as the results of the clinical studies or even the
data--is not even available at this time. Because the likelihood of harm from
COVID for a healthy person seems low (statistically), AND I am able to isolate
from vulnerable people if I become ill, AND the incidence of harm to healthy
people from the vaccines is not being candidly discussed, AND the reports
that the vaccines seem to offer little protection after just a few months ... it
does not seem prudent for me or my children to get the vaccine. I respect
others' right to decide for themselves whether the vaccines were created
in morally licit ways and whether their use promotes similar future developments
AND I respect others' right to decide their health care weighing the risks and
benefits of those decisions as they see fit. I am writing this to encourage
others who have a similar perspective to mine and to provide a little clarity
to my friends who might not understand why someone would be "hesitant."
[/quote]

And now with in-line comments:

* Dear Friends, I have heard some interesting explanations about why people
* (like me) are hesitant to get the COVID vaccine, such as irrational fear or
* selfish concern with freedom. I am responding with my reasons. There are two.

Translation: they know that their actions are being perceived as being
irrational and/or selfish, so this is a proactive "no I'm not" pushback attempt.

* Number 1. Since all of the vaccines were developed using cells
* obtained from aborted children ...

Saying "developed" here is a bit dodgy as the creation of the vaccines did
not use any aborted fetus cells/cell lines, nor in its manufacture. This
comment can only be alluding to safety testing done on the product during
development with cell lines historically derived from two abortions that
were conducted 40-50 years ago (one in the 1980s & one in the 1970s).
These are an industry standard test used on many (if not all) drugs,
which means their use is not unique to these vaccines.


* AND the bodies of aborted children are still sold for medical research,

Three problems with this statement.

First, is this "sold for" statement itself true? That depends on how one
interprets the word "sold": if you believe it in this context that it has
connotations where it is implying that there is a profit motive present,
then the claim is a falsehood (FYI, it has been illegal since 1993 to
make a profit from fetal tissue donations).


Second, were the cells used for this specific safety test from "sold" cells?
Short answer is that ~40 years ago, there wasn't a financial transaction
portion, so that's a "No".

Third, even though it is legal to charge expenses for the handling & transfer
of tissue donations, the most prominent organization, Planned Parenthood,
discontinued this practice in 2015.

* my acceptance of the vaccines would be an acceptance of the continuation
* of that practice. I do not want to promote abortion and do not believe that
* I have to sell out that principle in order to save lives.

A fair enough point, but as noted above, this use of cell lines which originated
from abortions 40-50 years ago are an industry standard test used on many
(if not all) drugs, which means their use is not unique to these vaccines, so
the ethical ramifications of this are that if one is going to decline based on
this factor, then ethical consistency requires that one will have to also decline
to use all drugs which have ever used these tests. Furthermore, as the default
is that they were probably used, so one cannot "not look" and assume that
they weren't used: one is ethically bound to go positively verify each drug
prior to accepting its use.


* Number 2. As a Catholic, I believe in free and informed consent
* regarding health care.

That has nothing to do with Catholicism.

* This principle exists because individuals have an obligation to make
* responsible decisions regarding health care and cannot do so if they
* are not free from coercion or do not have access to the necessary
* information.

Since the Pope has said "get your CoVid19 vaccination", just what
more information does a Catholic really need to have?


* Besides the stories of serious harm passed on to me from friends
in the medical industry, ...

"Stories" = individual anecdotes, not scientific, generalizable data.

* ... as well as many other news stories of serious injury, ...

As if no media source ever has any motivation to sell ads to eyeballs? /s

Just how many cases reported into VAERS have undergone their full
investigation and determined to have been actually caused by vaccination?

* the information necessary for me or my doctor to make a responsible decision
* regarding the vaccines--such as the results of the clinical studies or even the
* data--is not even available at this time.

There's two major problems with this statement.

The first is the question of just how much information is sufficient
for making a "responsible" decision? Because what's being implied
here is that there will some day be a point where everything is known
so the Risk:Benefit is no longer statistical, but is deterministic:
that *never* happens for anything ever.

The second is cuing in on this "data/results from clinical studies" part,
because its appearing to demand access to data that's illegal to release
to the public, as per Federal Law on human subject research (45 CFR 46) .

FYI, during the Trump administration, their big push to deregulate to help
polluting industries made a proposal which was really intended to invalidate
the use of any scientific data for Federal regulators: it was basically that
any research which didn't publish fully unrecused raw data wasn't allowed
to be used. This was quite clever because 45 CFR 46 required that HSR
data must be recused for at least the volunteers' PII & PHI.

To get a *responsible* understanding of research doesn't have to include
knowing the SSN# of every last participant, so when that's what's being
claimed/implied as the minimum required, they're not acting responsibly.


* Because the likelihood of harm from COVID for a healthy person seems low
* (statistically), AND ...

Logically invalid because one does not ever make a Risk:Benefit assessment
in the absence of context.

The context here is the risk of Vaccination vs risk of contracting CoVid, for
which if the latter is "seems low", then the risk of the former needs to be
substantially lower still to be justified.

* ... AND I am able to isolate from vulnerable people if I become ill,

Just because one is "able" to isolate doesn't mean that they actually are.

Furthermore, this phrasing implies that they would only choose to isolate
only *after* they believe that they've become ill, which is too late: they're
trying to ignore the fact that people are infectious when asymptomatic
so that they don't have to inconvenience themselves.

* AND the incidence of harm to healthy people from the vaccines is
* not being candidly discussed, ...

Except that that information already exists & has been broadly published
for making a *responsible* decision.

Now when you (+MD) doesn't trust said top level summary recommendations,
its not everyone else's job to hand you everything on a silver platter: you've
ethically taken the responsibility onto yourself to go do the work of whatever
level of "deep dive" homework into the details...and to do that without whining.

* AND the reports that the vaccines seem to offer little protection after just a few months

No, not quite: what's actually being discussed is the rate of protection
responsiveness, to minimize retransmission through society. That's a
different criteria than merely if one will be able to generate effective
antibodies to fight off an infection.

The human body is efficient in that it will stop producing stuff it doesn't
need, which is why antibodies in circulation decline over time (including
for 'naturally' acquired immunity), but the body never forgets what the
sequence is / how to make them: this has been proven with some recent
research where antibodies for the 1918 pandemic have been found in
100 year old living survivors, which proves that it never goes completely
away ... its just stored on the genetic "hard drive".


* ... it does not seem prudent for me or my children to get the vaccine.

Fine for yourself, but stop speaking for your kids: they're grown up and
are of majority age. As such, they're legally authorized to make their own
consent decision and barring exceptions, a parent isn't legally allowed to
consent for them, nor override their own consent decision.

* I respect others' right to decide for themselves whether the vaccines were
* created in morally licit ways and whether their use promotes similar future
* developments.

For one who has professed to be Catholic, the position of the Pope on
this topic should suffice, but apparently not:

The question of the ethics on data gathered though unethical practices goes
back decades before you were born; the prominent example being the Nazi
experimentation on concentration camp victims (see Nuremberg Trials).
<https://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/NEJM199005173222011>

The crux of the debate is if its use would risk future unethical behavior
(interpretation of sanctioning it) or if its non-use would compound human
suffering because not using it would allow others to die when they may
have otherwise been saved. What the general conclusion has been is
grounded in the observation that the historical harm is in the past and
cannot be undone (here, the fetus cannot be un-aborted). To accept
the knowledge gain is a means to respect the sacrifice made, which
aligns with the principle of (see Belmont Report: Respect for Persons;
Beneficence ).


* AND I respect others' right to decide their health care weighing the risks
* and benefits of those decisions as they see fit. I am writing this to
* encourage others who have a similar perspective to mine and to
* provide a little clarity to my friends who might not understand why
* someone would be "hesitant."

Translation (repeat from the top): they know that their actions are being
identified as being irrational and/or selfish, so they're looking for support
only from their like-minded friends, not from those who have a different
perspective to offer. For one harping on ethics, they're being disingenuous.


-hh