The Needle and the Damage Done

Is anti-vaxxism getting worse?

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A health worker administers a COVID-19 vaccine shot in Los Angeles. (Photo by Xinhua via Getty Images)

On Monday night, economist Patrick Chovanec surveyed the wreckage of Elon Musk’s Twitter with exasperation. “This place has become a hive of anti-vaxx paranoia,” he sighed. “I think I’m doing some good by rebutting it, but I’m just pissing into the wind. It’s depressing.”

He’s not alone. “I feel like anti-vaxxers on Twitter have gotten noticeably more insane since Elon took over,” said reporter Alex Griswold. “Which isn’t even a critique really… there is something to the sunlight-as-disinfectant idea. It might’ve been better if these folks were more obviously bonkers two years ago.”

How insane have they gotten?

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  1. Jon craig

    I am 70 and five-times vaccinated. I have never tested positive for COVID 19, but in December 2022 I was infected (twice) with the flu virus and was ill for 6 weeks, including 4 days in the hospital. As the doctors explained to me, there are plenty of viruses out there from which we have no protection. The anti-vax sideshow is just another example of people spewing their prejudices and unfounded opinions into the public square for the rest of us to step in.

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    Rlritt

    "They were deceived repeatedly about the efficacy of cloth masks, led to believe that they didn’t work and then that they worked better than they did."

    This is not true. In the beginning they did not push masks for the general public because the feared running of masks neededby medical personnel.

    Of course masks work or why surgeons wear them while doing surgery. People who visit their in a neo natal ward have to wear masks.

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  3. Autonomian

    Science is always learning and scientists are only human. My big take away from the pandemic was be skeptical of anyone who says I follow the Science, or worse, I AM the Science. It reminds me of the South Park parody that replaced God with ScienceDammit!

    People over 60, you should probably go get the shot. Your grandchildren will appreciate having you around. The rest of you, flip a coin.

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    Ben Connelly

    “ In 2019 the Kaiser Family Foundation found Democrats and Republicans largely agreed on whether parents should have the right not to vaccinate their kids for measles, mumps, and rubella.”

    Of course parents have a right not to vaccinate their kids. What they don’t have a right to do is send their kids to public school. Schools are well within their authority when requiring that students be vaccinated and refusing kids who aren’t vaccinated. But as far as “do parents literally have the right not to vaccinate their kids,” the obvious rejoinder is “what is the alternative - is someone going to send men with guns to the houses of people who don’t go get a shot for their kids?” No government is foolish enough to pick that fight.

    I’m very pro-vaccine, but I think what you meant by that original sentence wasn’t the question of whether or not parents had a right not to vaccinate their kids, but whether parents had a right to send unvaccinated kids to school.

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    BloggerBarbie

    There was overpromising, but I kind of interpreted that as the people selling it being excited about it--I was, too. I was hoping that the new tech would lead to much more effective vaccines that could use DNA messengers to adapt to mutations, maybe have a full-scale general coronavirus vax... it was a heady time. Alas, it didn't work out that way, but... um... how long have people been alive to not know that new tech always glitches, never performs the miracles it seems to promise, etc? It's not exactly hot news.

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  6. JRD4

    I think it a much broader problem. Medicine has become politicized. For example:

    While running for President, Biden, and his running mate questioned whether the "Trump vaccine" would be safe. After being elected, they were all in.

    Teenage girls who are naturally struggling with puberty get caught up in the current social contagion of transsexualism. Instead of parents being involved in accompanying their children through this difficult time toward normal biological sex identity, schools encourage transition, doctors provide "affirming care" and politicians like Elizabeth Warren claim a teenager has a "human right" to make unalterable surgical changes to their bodies and to change the sexual hormonal balance in their bodies.

    Regulatory bodies like the FDA and NIH have enormous power as research funding sources to emphasize politically favorable medical research.

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      Rlritt

      "schools encourage transition, doctors provide "affirming care" "

      No school I know would ever do that. I taught, I know current high school teachers and my son is a teacher. All in Orange County CA. So I would like to see numbers to back up this statement. And not a therapist or school nurse who just discusses trans sexualism in response to a student's question.

      Warren is just one senator and like to that quote and see if it was supported by other senators.

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        This comment has been deleted

  7. GregL

    Over 1.1 million Americans have died of COVID and over 3,700 have died in the last week - I'm curious, how would our responses, demands, and attitude be different if these were mostly children dying, not older adults?

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    1. On Fox River

      I am an elderly granddad. It doesn't bother me in the least that society is extra-protective of the young.

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        Soniak21

        Indeed. We're all going to die, and can't we agree that it's better if that death comes after 80 or 90 years of life than only 3 or 5?

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  8. Bloodredinabluestate

    I have had 5 Covid shots so I'm obviously not anti-vax. And I've never gotten Covid but that may be because I still avoid anything that involves a large crowd. But I can understand how the overpromising and underdelivering of the Covid vaccine have made people wary of the utility of this vaccine specifically and vaccines in general--especially regarding children. On a purely anecdotal basis, no one that I know who has had Covid, both the vaccinated and unvaccinated, very young and very old, has had anything that even remotely required hospitalization. Most had next to nothing and some had a lousy few days. Why would this make people wary of other vaccines? I think of the expression we used when I was trying cases and you caught a witness in a lie: "False in one, false in all." Maybe some people think that the powers that be have been lying to them about the need for/ efficacy of other common vaccines.
    Another thing that needs mentioning is how the unvaccinated were portrayed as selfish menaces to society. Now that we know that the vaccinated transmit Covid just as easily as the unvaxxed, the alleged benefit to society is pretty much erased. There is still a personal benefit in maybe getting a milder case, but all those hysterical screeds against the unvaxxed were rubbish.

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      Rlritt

      First off, people aren't perfect. And secondly, Covid was a new apparently deadly disease that the US scientists created an incredible vaccine in record time. No one knew anything about it so they erred on the side of caution. But I saw no storm troopers dragging people out of stores and forcing vaccines and masks on them.

      In fact, and this is true, I knew a guy who was a principle of a school, who preached that vaccines were deadly and should be avoided. He got COVID and went to his school unmasked, refused to believe he had Covid, in a few days he was bedridden and dead by the end of the week. I don't know how many people he infected.

      But damn it, at least he stuck to his guns and died as a rebel without a clue. And yes he died of covid.

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    MatthewRobin

    I did not get the booster, does that mean I am anti-vax?

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    1. JRD4

      It is common today for advocates to attach disparaging labels to anyone that disagrees with them. Opposed to gay marriage, your a homophobe. Against teaching trans ideology to 6 year olds, your a transphobe. In favor of merit based college admission, your a racist.

      To make your own risk analysis, and to choose not be boosted makes you an anti-vaxer. Simple.

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        Rlritt

        Make up sht that doesn't apply to vast majority of people and you're an ideologue.

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    RightWithReason

    So ... pipe up if you disagree, but if Trump Suddenly Died, would that not constitute a win-win for pretty much everyone on all sides? The anti-vaxxers would have their ultimate martyr (obviously they'd use him as their prime example, regardless of the actual cause of his death - karma got 'im for Operation Warp Speed, after all), and we'd be rid of the true plague that's been endemic to our country over the last seven years.

    It would be a terrible tragedy, of course, but ... I suppose we'd find a way to move on ... somehow....

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      Blandrews71

      Trump is vaccinated.

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        Rlritt

        That's his point. Trump advocated vaccines and was actually booed by a crowd of his supporters.

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Nick Catoggio is a staff writer for The Dispatch and writes the newsletter Boiling Frogs. He previously blogged as Allahpundit for Hot Air. ⁣  ⁣  Subscribe to Boiling Frogs here »
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