The Times - UK (2022-01-01)

16 2GM Saturday January 1 2022 | the times

News

It’s not always nefarious plots by Bill
Gates, brain control by 5G masts or
elaborate conspiracies involving Pfizer-
installed bioweapons. Some of the most
compelling arguments by antivaxers
use real data and cite official sources,
but while making faulty conclusions.

Claim Thousands of people have died
after getting the vaccine
Response We all die. And, trite as it
sounds, that’s crucial in understanding
a most common antivax claim: that offi-
cial websites, such as that of the UK
medical regulator, show that the vacci-
nes have caused mass deaths and dis-
ability.
Those websites do record a bewilder-
ing array of post-vaccine disease. And
this is exactly what you’d expect. In the
UK, EU and US, doctors report illness-
es, oddities and deaths that occur post-
vaccine to a central database, irrespec-

drug proven to treat Covid was a

60-year old steroid called dexameth-

asone that costs pennies.

Claim People under 60 who are vacci-

nated are twice as likely to die

Response This compelling statistic,

shared and promoted by antivax

groups, has an unimpeachable source:

the Office for National Statistics.

And it is absolutely true.

But this isn’t a lesson in the danger of

vaccines, but in the danger of counter-

intuitive statistics. Stuart McDonald,

chairman of the Covid-19 Actuaries

Response Group, called it a near-text-

book example of a phenomenon

known as Simpson’s paradox.

In each age group — 30 to 40, 40 to

50, 50 to 60 — vaccines reduce your

risk of death. Yet when these ages are

grouped together, the reverse appears

to happen. Why? Because the average

age of the vaccinated group is a lot

higher than that of the unvaccinated

one. Almost all children under ten are

in the unvaccinated group. Almost all

adults over 40 are in the vaccinated

group. What the statistic really shows is

that older people are more likely to die.

Claim We count too many deaths

Response According to official data,

148,000 people have died within 28

days of a Covid diagnosis. If someone

caught Covid 27 days ago then got run

over by a bus, they would still be a Covid

death. We are including people who

died “with Covid”, instead of just those

who died “from Covid”.

This “28-day” figure is a rough and

ready statistic used to provide an early

estimate of deaths, but is no substitute

for medical diagnosis. That is why, sep-

arately, we also wait and record those

deaths in which Covid is mentioned on

the death certificate. This number takes

longer to arrive but is considered a truer

reflection of reality. It stands at 173,000,

which is 25,000 higher than the 28-day

figure. The number of Covid victims

who lived 28 days before dying more

than offsets people run over by buses.

Claim Covid is no worse than flu

Response According to Public Health

England, in a normal year — a year

with no public health mitigations — it

would not be unusual to have between

10,000 and 20,000 flu deaths.

In the past two years we have had the

most stringent public health mitiga-

tions in history — enough that flu dis-

appeared. And we have seen over

150,000 Covid deaths. Covid is not flu.

Claim Vaccines don’t work any more

Response There is no doubt that Omi-

cron has severely hit the effectiveness

of vaccines. Knowing how much is hard

to assess this early on.

Laboratory work suggested a huge

drop in the ability of vaccines to stop in-

fection, but also that a booster dose

bumps it up. Preliminary real world

data corroborates this. Two doses of

AstraZeneca seems to have almost no

effect against infection, but a booster

brought it back to almost 50 per cent.

Crucially, scientists always thought

the vaccines would hold out better at

their primary job — stopping severe

disease.

According to the best estimates of the

UK Health Security Agency, two doses

still make you more than 50 per cent

less likely to end up in hospital. Three

brings that up to almost 90 per cent.

There is a simpler way of understand-

ing the effectiveness of vaccines. Last

winter, 50,000 cases led to about 1,

deaths. This autumn they led to 100.

News Coronavirus

The facts to fox those

antivaxer arguments

tive of what caused them. If you vacci-

nate an entire population, there are

going to be a lot of these.

All that matters is, are there more

than you would expect in a population

that hadn’t been vaccinated? So far,

statisticians have identified a very

slight extra risk of clotting with the As-

traZeneca vaccine, with 75 reported

fatal cases in the UK, and a slight risk of

non-fatal heart problems with Pfizer.

Anyone citing UK vaccine reporting

statistics to claim mass side effects is

ignoring many disclaimers. This will be

bad news for some: officially reported

side effects include a man who claimed

his penis grew larger after vaccination.

Claim Footballers who are vaccinated

keep dying

Response Last month a statistic was

shared widely that claimed 108 footbal-

lers and coaches had died in 2021. The

source appeared to be an Israeli news

site, which trawled the internet to col-

late deaths in sports around the world

at all levels of the game.

Is it unusually high? Without a com-

parison to other years using the same

methodology we can’t know. In 2020,

though, Fifa backed research looking

systematically at 16 countries’ “sudden

death registries”. In a normal year,

across the world, it found 150 entries for

players dying during football games

alone.

Claim Pharmaceutical companies

are suppressing drugs to beat Covid

because it won’t earn them big profits

Response Ivermectin is a Nobel Prize-

winning drug that is cheap, mass pro-

duced and highly effective. The prob-

lem is, what it is highly effective at is

treating parasites. This has not stopped

it becoming a cause célèbre among

those on social media who claim drug

firms are suppressing treatments, espe-

cially ivermectin, that would stop the

pandemic.

The claim — of efficacy, if not con-

spiracy — is not absurd. Studies

suggested that, along with many other

compounds, it might have an effect on

Covid. Later, this hypothesis was

backed up by clinical trials. The most

impressive of those trials, including a

randomised study in Egypt, turned out

to be fraudulent. It is being assessed in

Oxford’s Recovery Trial, but as yet

there is not strong enough evidence to

recommend its use.

As to the claim that leading pharma-

ceutical companies are suppressing a

cheap medicine, it’s very hard to square

that with the knowledge that the first

Tom Whipple offers a

guide to some of the

most persuasive and

common assertions and

why they are incorrect

T

housands of

anti-vaccine

activists have

joined a group

that is

threatening to carry out

“direct action” and

running combat training

sessions, in a sign of

growing radicalisation

among conspiracists

(Tom Ball writes).

A group calling itself

Alpha Men Assemble

has hosted several

meetings for

“training

and

strategy

tactics”.

In the

most recent

session, on

Tuesday,

as many as

100 activists

took part in

boxing drills

on a beach

at Littlehampton, West

Sussex.

Two further meetings

are scheduled: in

Brownhills,

Staffordshire, next

Saturday and in

Motherwell, North

Lanarkshire, on January

29. Attendees are

instructed to wear a

“black uniform, black

boots and a black hat”.

A “task team” will be

selected at Brownhills to

carry out the group’s

first “task” in mid to late

January. The nature of

action being planned is

unclear but those hoping

to be selected are told:

“You will need a cool

head and you will need

to control your

emotions.”

The group’s activities

are co-

ordinated

via

Telegram, the encrypted

messaging service. Set

up in mid-December,

Alpha Men Assemble

has 6,000 members.

The organisers are not

known but a source said

several leaders might

have military

experience. Danny, the

administrator of Alpha

Men Assemble, did not

respond to a request for

comment.

The group has striking

similarities to QAnon, a

US conspiracist group

whose members

stormed the Capitol last

year.

Like QAnon, which

puts forward a bizarre

conspiracy that a cabal

of Satanic paedophiles

worked to bring down

President Trump, the

group says its guiding

principle is “saving the

children”. The group

also exhibits traits of

far-right movements,

including a paranoia

over “antifa [anti-facsist]

infiltration”.

Members have

reposted stories

published by Tommy

Robinson News, a

channel run by a former

leader of the English

Defence League.

While Alpha Men

Assemble insists that it

does not seek to incite

violence, videos on its

channel show how to

punch and kick. One

post reads: “I hope you

have a fire in your belly.

Time for action. No

more f***ing about.”

The emergence of the

group shows how far

antivaxers will go to

support their baseless

claims. In its messaging,

the group has criticised

the ineffectiveness of

protests organised by

the likes of Piers

Corbyn. It instead

promised “pure

unadulterated defiance”.

On Wednesday,

antivaxers led by Corbyn

and Jeff Wyatt, a former

Ukip candidate, held a

rally in Milton Keynes.

Some activists stormed a

coronavirus testing site,

abusing staff and

stealing test equipment.

John O’Looney, a

funeral director and

antivaxer, had been due

to speak but is believed

to be in hospital with

Covid. He did not

respond to a request for

comment.

Imran Ahmed, chief

executive of the Centre

for Countering Digital

Hate, said: “Alpha Men

Assemble is one of a

number of groups

promoting a fantasy that

threats and violence by

self-proclaimed strong

men must be used to

stop the public taking

lifesaving vaccinations.

“This group’s military-

style training adds to

concerns that antivax

groups are becoming

increasingly violent.”

Alpha Men

assemble

for combat

training

a

o

v

The Alpha Men Assemble Telegramth

group stages boxing drills,

including a session that

took place on a beach in

Littlehampton, West

Sussex, earlier this week