Coronavirus.

tek-monkey

wanna see my snake?
BMJ
That good old right wing source that I’m sure you’ll debunk!
Excellent, a reputable source! I'll take a look, which of your previous points is this meant to address?
 

SketchyMagpie

Well-Known Forumite
BMJ
That good old right wing source that I’m sure you’ll debunk!
Another prominent vaccine expert, who asked not to be quoted by name, said that many of the issues alleged by the article's main source "are things you wouldn't want to see happen, like needles and syringes and things discarded in bags. But that doesn't have to do with data integrity.
...
Jackson's accusations "were made a year ago, at which time Ventavia notified the appropriate parties. The allegations were investigated and determined to be unsubstantiated.
...
"There's a lot of stuff in there that really doesn't speak to whether the [Pfizer vaccine trial] data were recorded correctly."



None of that is to say that genuine poor standards shouldn't be reported, but it wouldn't surprise me given how sloppiness seeps in to probably every workplace on the planet. People are people, after all.

I think the following quote from the below link sums it up nicely:

Given the vast amount of funding, and thousands if not millions of researchers working on COVID, alongside the successes there will inevitably be more examples of alleged misconduct – leading, inevitably, to sensationalist headlines. But when this happens, it is important to remember how many lives the vaccines and other treatments have saved. Yes, science is a human activity. Yes, integrity can be a problem. Yes, fraud and misconduct will occasionally occur, but science also produces remarkable results.


Don't let perfect be the enemy of good.
 
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gilbert grape

Well-Known Forumite
You still don’t get that no other vaccine/pandemic/spell has ever drawn so much controversy. Always been my point and will be until we get the truth, which appears to be increasing if you bother to listen. The idiotic conspiracy accusations make you look like d1ck5 to anybody with an open mind!
 

SketchyMagpie

Well-Known Forumite
You still don’t get that no other vaccine/pandemic/spell has ever drawn so much controversy.

And you still don't get the significance of the fact that this is the first pandemic for which we have had the internet.

How on Earth do you expect that the last pandemic, over 100 years ago, would have had the same number of dissenting voices visible across the world or that they could in any way be even conceivably comparable in terms of how people have communicated about it?

In any case, why are we even discussing this when you previously claimed everyone that has been triple vaxxed is going to develop serious illnesses in a matter of weeks? Just wait until that has come true next month and we won't have a leg to stand on (probably because they will have fallen off).

Or is it just that you don't even believe this yourself?
 
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SketchyMagpie

Well-Known Forumite
idiotic conspiracy accusations make you look like d1ck5 to anybody with an open mind!
Just out of curiosity, do you believe that covid 19 is a natural virus, a lab leak, a bio weapon, something else... ?
I won't jump on whatever you say, unless you want to have a discussion, but I'm just wondering how you think the pandemic began is all.
 
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gilbert grape

Well-Known Forumite
Just out of curiosity, do you believe that covid 19 is a natural virus, a lab leak, a bio weapon, something else... ?
I won't jump on whatever you say, unless you want to have a discussion, but I'm just wondering how you think the pandemic began is all.
I actually believe it's a lab leak and in turn it's spread and brought the most harm to those not sat in ivory towers.
Society by design, the poor ALWAYS lose out. Whatever term we use, there's no escaping that's what happened and that is NOT OK.
 

Gramaisc

Forum O. G.
Lab leaks do happen.

The last fatality from Smallpox was due to a lab leak in Birmingham, after the vaccination programme had been effectively eradicated it in the wild.
 

SketchyMagpie

Well-Known Forumite
I've read articles from early 1900s written by surgeons, saying they had no proof masks did anything apart from stop larger splashes of blood and respecting patients by protecting from any possible sneezes.
So how come you'll not believe the vast majority of surgeons today who say that masks are effective, but you'll believe surgeons with 100+ years less medical understanding and advancement?

I don't know about you but if I had to see a medical practitioner and had to pick between one from the modern age or one from the 1900s....
 

gilbert grape

Well-Known Forumite
So how come you'll not believe the vast majority of surgeons today when they say that masks are effective when you'll believe surgeons with 100+ years less medical understanding?
Because there are loads of medical people still saying the same now and if, for example, they were a raging success why would cases soar in a place like Scotland where they were enforced? If something is proved as inconclusive surely you make up your own mind?
 

Admin

You there; behave!
Staff member
I am proud of all of you - there hasn't been a single report so far, despite the muck-slinging going on!

Please remember, no-one has ever changed their mind as a result of an argument on the Internet. By all means air your views, but ultimately no-one cares about opinions other than their own, so don't try and force it on people.

I do find it curious that people rarely believe in just one conspiracy theory; it seems like once you "open your mind" to one, you suddenly feel obliged to entertain them all. This was a conversation about COVID, then once the conspiracies started popping up it almost instantly segued to "Building 7", which Google tells me is one of the World Trade Centre buildings - completely unrelated to COVID!
 

The Hawk

Well-Known Forumite
Because there are loads of medical people still saying the same now and if, for example, they were a raging success why would cases soar in a place like Scotland where they were enforced? If something is proved as inconclusive surely you make up your own mind?
It's a good question and I'll try to give part of the answer.

Firstly, there are masks and then there are masks. They range from basic materials, through surgical masks, then FFP2/N95/KN95 masks through to FFP3 masks. You could go on to full bio suits and respirators as well. The better, the quality of the mask, the better the theoretical protection. I say theoretical because a mask is only going to perform to its maximum protection if worn correctly as well.

Then we need to consider where and when the masks are worn/not worn. Somehow, I doubt anyone wears a high grade mask 24 hours a day, so the situations where people don't wear a mask also need to be looked at. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.

As I've said before masks are only part of the answer, but a high grade mask, worn correctly, will offer a very high level of protection whilst it is being worn. Wearing a mask in some high risk environments, but not in other high risks environments, will seriously compromise your overall protection.

Even when masks were mandatory in indoor environments, it was fascinating to observe how many people thought that their mask was a fashion accessory rather than some form of protection; mostly poor quality masks that for many people I saw, seemed to be offering what little protection they would afford, to their necks.
 

Gramaisc

Forum O. G.
I read an article about that recently, fascinating. To think we no longer get smallpox, or polio, and Aids might be eradicated in my lifetime.
Polio is still available, should you wish to avail of it. But you would have to make special effort, or be remarkably unlucky.
 

gilbert grape

Well-Known Forumite
Why do you think that surgeons would have continued wearing them for 100 years if the evidence really was inconclusive...?
Because, as I've said, it's inconclusive in most settings.
 

SketchyMagpie

Well-Known Forumite
Because, as I've said, it's inconclusive in most settings.
Fair enough, though that research is over a decade old and much more has been done on a much larger scale in recent years given the circumstances.

Two things I'll concede here: 1) it was not really known at the start of the pandemic how effective masks were going to be (personally I was willing to take the risk of maybe wearing a mask for nothing because the potential benefits outweighed the downsides) and 2) some people wear types of masks that are significantly less effective, but which is probably better than none at all.

Last year a randomised clinical trial of nearly 350,000 people in Bangladesh concluded that surgical face masks reduce the spread of Covid-19 and are most effective when accompanied by clear and efficient messaging.


Here's another study where 1.1 million students in 3,000 schools were the subjects specifically during the Delta/Omicron waves in the second half of last year. They found that schools with a mask mandate saw 72% fewer secondary infections (that is, students infected with Covid-19 passing it on to other students) than schools with no or partial mandates.


And here's a study from the journal you linked to earlier, the BMJ, which also concludes that masks are effective at preventing the spread of Covid-19: "The researchers reported that fabric face masks “blocked between 62.6% and 87.1% of fine particles, whereas surgical masks protected against an average of 78.2% of fine particles. N95 masks blocked 99.6% of fine particles.”"

 
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tek-monkey

wanna see my snake?
I do find it curious that people rarely believe in just one conspiracy theory; it seems like once you "open your mind" to one, you suddenly feel obliged to entertain them all. This was a conversation about COVID, then once the conspiracies started popping up it almost instantly segued to "Building 7", which Google tells me is one of the World Trade Centre buildings - completely unrelated to COVID!
There are studies into this, how disinformation channels are formed then become their own proof as it were for future issues. Also the way communication patterns differ between conspiracy theorists and conformists, there was even attempts to use AI to spot people most likely to spread disinformation before they started, must look that up again!
 
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