It’s a maddening New York Times article about the thousands whose lives were irreparably derailed by the COVID vaccine. To their credit, it’s a reasonably down-the-road article. Perhaps that’s because there are so many shortfalls regarding research on the vaccine’s side effects. There are high benchmarks for injury compensation, but there is no information on how to meet the standard. The medical community is not moving to address the innumerable side effects that have afflicted these Americans. No one seems to want to help them or even hear their concerns.
It's an endless stream of issues, from unreliable databases to government disinterest. The establishment appears set in ignoring the pain and suffering these people have endured. The side effects include the usual rashes, but neurological disorders, specifically debilitating tinnitus, were mentioned numerous times in the piece, along with myocarditis, which wasn’t even first detected by our medical professionals—it was the Israelis. In all, 13,000 injury claims have been filed through the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program, and barely 20 percent have been reviewed.
As of now, the Times wrote that 47 were deemed eligible for compensation, but only 19 individuals have received payments averaging $3,600. Former top Food and Drug Administration officials went on record empathizing with those suffering, noting that there should be recognition that serious side effects did strike an untold amount of people. It's a lengthy article, but while the headline says “thousands,” it could be millions. We cannot determine how many people got screwed over by getting the vaccine, which is disconcerting. Though, fixing that issue opens a new can of worms regarding the centralization of healthcare systems and databases (via NYT):
Within minutes of getting the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine, Michelle Zimmerman felt pain racing from her left arm up to her ear and down to her fingertips. Within days, she was unbearably sensitive to light and struggled to remember simple facts.
She was 37, with a Ph.D. in neuroscience, and until then could ride her bicycle 20 miles, teach a dance class and give a lecture on artificial intelligence, all in the same day. Now, more than three years later, she lives with her parents. Eventually diagnosed with brain damage, she cannot work, drive or even stand for long periods of time.
[…]
Dr. Janet Woodcock, a longtime leader of the Food and Drug Administration, who retired in February, said she believed that some recipients had experienced uncommon but “serious” and “life-changing” reactions beyond those described by federal agencies.
“I feel bad for those people,” said Dr. Woodcock, who became the F.D.A.’s acting commissioner in January 2021 as the vaccines were rolling out. “I believe their suffering should be acknowledged, that they have real problems, and they should be taken seriously.”
[…]
Federal officials and independent scientists face a number of challenges in identifying potential vaccine side effects.
The nation’s fragmented health care system complicates detection of very rare side effects, a process that depends on an analysis of huge amounts of data. That’s a difficult task when a patient may be tested for Covid at Walgreens, get vaccinated at CVS, go to a local clinic for minor ailments and seek care at a hospital for serious conditions. Each place may rely on different health record systems.
There is no central repository of vaccine recipients, nor of medical records, and no easy to way to pool these data. Reports to the largest federal database of so-called adverse events can be made by anyone, about anything. It’s not even clear what officials should be looking for.
[…]
Shaun Barcavage, 54, a nurse practitioner in New York City who has worked on clinical trials for H.I.V. and Covid, said that ever since his first Covid shot, merely standing up sent his heart racing — a symptom suggestive of postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome, a neurological disorder that some studies have linked to both Covid and, much less often, vaccination.
He also experienced stinging pain in his eyes, mouth and genitals, which has abated, and tinnitus, which has not.
“I can’t get the government to help me,” Mr. Barcavage said of his fruitless pleas to federal agencies and elected representatives. “I am told I’m not real. I’m told I’m rare. I’m told I’m coincidence.”
Renee France, 49, a physical therapist in Seattle, developed Bell’s palsy — a form of facial paralysis, usually temporary — and a dramatic rash that neatly bisected her face. Bell’s palsy is a known side effect of other vaccines, and it has been linked to Covid vaccination in some studies.
But Dr. France said doctors were dismissive of any connection to the Covid vaccines. The rash, a bout of shingles, debilitated her for three weeks, so Dr. France reported it to federal databases twice.
“I thought for sure someone would reach out, but no one ever did,” she said.
Of course, the government isn’t convinced these side effects were caused by the COVID vaccine. So, what about research? The Times said, “National Institutes of Health is conducting virtually no studies on Covid vaccine safety.” It’s buried in the piece, way down, but it includes how European research determined that “for some young and healthy people, the benefit of Covid shots may no longer outweigh the risks.” And it’s not just the hoi polloi who are afflicted; even medical professionals have been struck by side effects. The research gap between the US and the rest of the world on COVID vaccine side effects is rather big, too:
Federal researchers also comb through databases that combine electronic health records and insurance claims on tens of millions of Americans. The scientists monitor the data for 23 conditions that may occur following Covid vaccination. Officials remain alert to others that may pop up, Dr. Daskalakis said.
But there are gaps, some experts noted. The Covid shots administered at mass vaccination sites were not recorded in insurance claims databases, for example, and medical records in the United States are not centralized.
[…]
In Hong Kong, the government analyzed centralized medical records of patients after vaccination and paid people to come forward with problems. The strategy identified “a lot of mild cases that other countries would not otherwise pick up,” said Ian Wong, a researcher at the University of Hong Kong who led the nation’s vaccine safety efforts.
That included the finding that in rare instances — about seven per million doses — the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine triggered a bout of shingles serious enough to require hospitalization.
The European Medicines Agency has linked the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines to facial paralysis, tingling sensations and numbness. The E.M.A. also counts tinnitus as a side effect of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, although the American health agencies do not.
[…]
The F.D.A. is monitoring reports of tinnitus, but “at this time, the available evidence does not suggest a causal association with the Covid-19 vaccines,” the agency said in a statement.
Despite surveillance efforts, U.S. officials were not the first to identify a significant Covid vaccine side effect: myocarditis in young people receiving mRNA vaccines. It was Israeli authorities who first raised the alarm in April 2021. Officials in the United States said at the time that they had not seen a link.
[…]
The federal government has long run the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, designed to compensate people who suffer injuries after vaccination. Established more than three decades ago, the program sets no limit on the amounts awarded to people found to have been harmed.
But Covid vaccines are not covered by that fund because Congress has not made them subject to the excise tax that pays for it. Some lawmakers have introduced bills to make the change.
Instead, claims regarding Covid vaccines go to the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program. Intended for public health emergencies, this program has narrow criteria to pay out and sets a limit of $50,000, with stringent standards of proof.
[…]
Dr. Ilka Warshawsky, a 58-year-old pathologist, said she lost all hearing in her right ear after a Covid booster shot. But hearing loss is not a recognized side effect of Covid vaccination.
The compensation program for Covid vaccines sets a high bar for proof, she said, yet offers little information on how to meet it: “These adverse events can be debilitating and life-altering, and so it’s very upsetting that they’re not acknowledged or addressed.”
There’s a lot to unpack here, but one of the shortfalls in the piece is the lack of an apology for those who were branded anti-science kooks for claiming the shot made them severely impaired. Facial paralysis, hearing loss, and other auditory and cardiological defects should be taken seriously, not viewed as some populist rebellion against modern science for the sake of making a political point. The lab coats can’t claim that ground, as they were the ones who said if we criticized them, we were attacking science. It was a puerile response because the medical community’s game of running interference for Democrats got wrecked.
The subplot is that while it is problematic that we don’t know what to look for or even have a clear number of Americans who were impacted by the vaccine, the piece makes a case for centralized healthcare systems, which is another political battle for which we’ll have another time. In an era where databases creep people out, good luck making the case for one now, given what has happened. I would also bet this wouldn’t fall along liberal and conservative lines. There are some voter groups considered heavily Democratic who would balk at such a system.
I got the shot after getting over the initial COVID infection pre-vaccine. It turns out I didn’t need it. I was lucky and had some fatigue, a slight fever, muscle aches, and the overall feeling of a bad hangover for half a day. Some Tylenol managed the symptoms, and I was fine the next day. No blood clots were reported, thankfully, but if I could do it again—I’d nix the shot. I already acquired natural immunity; frankly, these people lied to us.
I don’t know about any future applicants, but for the 13,000 who have already filed, Dr. Anthony Fauci should be on the hook for their compensation, or at least part of it.
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