I'm a nurse vaccinating in Montreal. Just to add to the discussion, I'm happy to report that a great number of people are coming in for AZ, and they have the most sensible views, seeing through the media noise and hype. I've realized that by and large, people aren't as stupid as we think they are. I also believe that fully vaccinated people should be lifted from restrictions. I know, I know, the anti-vaccers will scream about discrimination and human rights. Sorry but vaccinated people have rights too ... not to be exposed to fulminating super-spreaders of variants like them maybe? Some days I just feel mad at the whole mess.
Oh I can sooo relate, I live in Germany but follow CAN news closely (family ties) and in the space of 2 weeks I was told the AZ vaccine was both very safe and too dangerous for me to take. Lockdown restrictions are so confusing here with every city and state having different rules that the government had to nationalise lockdown rules. The vaccine roll has, as an understatement, been a massive clusterfuck (pardon my French). But slowly things are getting better and I expect by Mid to late summer anyone who wants a jab will get it. I expect pretty the same for Canada
Thank you for this excellent analysis. As a follower of rules, respecter of science and of public programs, I go along with public health restrictions and offerings. But...even I am getting a bit tired of these messages. Too much immediate information of random studies given without context has been a problem. I understand that science changes (no masks to masks) but every little blip without an explanation or clear understanding of statistics has been detrimental.
I stopped reading when he claimed that pausing AZ was a statement that it was more dangerous than covid. It was not such a statement. Inferring that is bad-faith communications, there's an onus on the reader as well as the writer.
As other posters are noting, most are not afraid of AZ, they haven't taken that lesson that the CEO was all-to-eager to read-into the pause. Most understand that pro-active harm done has to be taken far more seriously than harm done by omission, that the trust in the vaccine system is important to many vaccines across many diseases and decades.
The Line is certainly, um, diverse this week. One rant about how WE were the stupid ones to trust Doug Ford to do anything, it's all on us; another about how the public are the dumb ones that need the most-careful statements at all times from public health.
There have been bad calls but everybody I talk to knows the larger story: stay away from people, stay away from their breath. All the rest falls out from that.
This article pairs nicely with last week's dispatch. The public health experts sound like they are talking to children because the press has enabled them to for the last year.
Imagine if public health officials had met questions like this since March 2020:
"Quarantining healthy citizens was not included in any provincial or federal pandemic response framework. What data do you have about the benefits of this? And the harms? How can you be confident that this will be of such substantial benefit to the public that it justifies the unprecedented and indefinite suspension of numerous Charter Rights?"
Or, "How come you continue to report the case fatality rate rather than the infection fatality rate? Aren't you concerned that that will make it harder for Canadians to judge a commensurate pandemic response? I think Canadians can understand that there are many people who are getting the virus who don't go and get tested.
Etc.
If public health officials had been cutting their teeth on questions like that last spring, they'd have their message clearer now.
I hope someone can help me. I linked to the CBC article that is supposed to show that “National Advisory Committee on Vaccinations determines that the risk from the AstraZeneca vaccine to those same individuals is higher than the virus itself?” but I cannot find a statement like that in the article anywhere. What am I missing?
To our understanding, that may only be true for the 20-29 cohort; and that's because the risk to them of COVID is already extraordinarily small, barring pre-existing conditions.
Hi Ed - I take it as implicit that, if NACI indicates that people 16-55 should not take the AZ vaccine - and there are no other vaccines available to those people for a period of some months - then NACI views their potential infection during that time period as less risky than their risk of blood clot from the vaccine itself. This is visible in the argumentation presented by NACI itself: that people over 55 should take the AZ vaccine because their risk of death from COVID is sufficiently high to offset risk of adverse events.
I copied the entire article, put it into a Libreoffice document and did a search for cohort. The only reference the search got was “Speaking to reporters in Niagara Falls, Ont., Ontario Premier Doug Ford said today that the province would follow NACI's guidance and reserve the current supply of AstraZeneca for those in the older cohort.” - so I can only conclude that we are looking at different articles.
Second. My reading of the article is substantively different than your own. To me it is a cautionary in nature. Key to me are the following
“AstraZeneca issued a statement this evening saying that it respects the decision by NACI and noting that Health Canada's guidance on the vaccine has not changed since last week.
"Regulatory authorities in the U.K., European Union, the World Health Organization and Health Canada have concluded that the benefits of using our vaccine to protect people from this deadly virus significantly outweigh the risks across all adult age groups," said AstraZeneca spokesperson Carlo Mastrangelo in the statement.”
, “"This is something that is very rare and we need to continue to monitor it," said Dr. Supriya Sharma, Health Canada's chief medical adviser, adding this is a sign that Canada has a robust monitoring system.
"It's reasonable to pause for a period of time while this continues to be evaluated," she said. "I fully understand this can be confusing."
Recognizing that there might be some relationship between AztrZenica and blood clotting, there were a number of possible avenues forward for health officials. First, don’t inform anyone and carry on as they were, second, let people know and say that there might be a link but we are assuming that it isn’t much of an issue and so we will carry on with the status quo, third, we don’t think that this is a significant issue but we think it prudent to pause until we have a better understanding, or fourth, etc. possibly a number of other more draconian responses.
The considered options were the second and the third. Your view seems to be that the third option implies that a decision has been made that the potential dangers of the drug outweigh the potential dangers of the disease. While I understand that view, and some official might actually have believed it two weeks ago, I believe that it ignores a very significant factor. Getting a jab involves trust between the giver and the receiver that whatever risks there might be are known to both. As soon as a potential risk is discovered, but the severity of the risk is not satisfactorily determined, an accurate risk assessment cannot be given. Without that, the trust factor is undermined.
The article cited is two weeks old. If you go to the Alberta website today https://www.alberta.ca/covid19-vaccine.aspx you should find, among others, the following statements:
Get vaccinated as soon as you can, no matter what vaccine is provided.
At this time:
• AstraZeneca is recommended for people under 64 who are less at risk of developing severe illness.
• Moderna and Pfizer are being prioritized for people most at risk of severe outcomes, due to limited supply.
I also don’t think that the statement that you make, “there are no other vaccines available to those people for a period of some months - then NACI views their potential infection during that time period as less risky than their risk of blood clot from the vaccine itself” is a given. The above statements illustrate that your months timeline has not proven accurate. In addition, if you click on the “Phase 2B” link on the above, you will see that anyone from 16 + with health complications is now eligible to be vaccinated. (considering the above bullets, I infer that they will receive either Moderna or Pfizer)
Over the last few days, it appears that TheLine has taken on the task of undermining faith in our health care system as it is attempting to deal with the Pandemic. Because the situation has been a fluid one for a long time this is relatively easy to do, especially when the evidence used is selective and interpreted to advance a particular narrative.
Doing so is, of course, your prerogative. As far as I can tell, your purpose is to show readers how health officials and the media shouldn’t simply be taken at face value. In my view, that is a reasonable goal. If it is not done with a degree of caution, however, there is a predictable externality. It provides justification for those who want to close their ears to anything that health officials have to say. I hope that that is not your actual intent.
Like everything in Canada right now, it has been politicized. After all Health Care is run by Government regardless of mass incompetence and waste. The media has been politicized and has become a voice for the government to spread their message. The internet has been politicized and again there is but one message allowed. It is beginning to feel a whole lot like a totalitarian regime just as they have in China. Forced incarceration or stay at home measures with consequences should you disobey. Soon forced vaccination or one will not be able to travel. Its beginning to get extremely frightening. Now they speak of a guaranteed income to which all Canadians pay for but the government will be controlling. Meaning they have the power to stop payment should you disagree with the way things are moving in Canada. I would suspect we would be handing them complete control over whether we eat or obey. Canada and Canadians frighten me due to their passive dominance by government and the ideal being pushed that they know best. That statement is the furthest thing from truth I have heard to date. Freedom comes at a price and many men and women died for us to have it. Its given up on the ideal that the government will care for you. Its the last thing Government will do. They have not the knowledge or respect for humanity and care only about power and control.
I'm a nurse vaccinating in Montreal. Just to add to the discussion, I'm happy to report that a great number of people are coming in for AZ, and they have the most sensible views, seeing through the media noise and hype. I've realized that by and large, people aren't as stupid as we think they are. I also believe that fully vaccinated people should be lifted from restrictions. I know, I know, the anti-vaccers will scream about discrimination and human rights. Sorry but vaccinated people have rights too ... not to be exposed to fulminating super-spreaders of variants like them maybe? Some days I just feel mad at the whole mess.
Oh I can sooo relate, I live in Germany but follow CAN news closely (family ties) and in the space of 2 weeks I was told the AZ vaccine was both very safe and too dangerous for me to take. Lockdown restrictions are so confusing here with every city and state having different rules that the government had to nationalise lockdown rules. The vaccine roll has, as an understatement, been a massive clusterfuck (pardon my French). But slowly things are getting better and I expect by Mid to late summer anyone who wants a jab will get it. I expect pretty the same for Canada
Thank you for this excellent analysis. As a follower of rules, respecter of science and of public programs, I go along with public health restrictions and offerings. But...even I am getting a bit tired of these messages. Too much immediate information of random studies given without context has been a problem. I understand that science changes (no masks to masks) but every little blip without an explanation or clear understanding of statistics has been detrimental.
I stopped reading when he claimed that pausing AZ was a statement that it was more dangerous than covid. It was not such a statement. Inferring that is bad-faith communications, there's an onus on the reader as well as the writer.
As other posters are noting, most are not afraid of AZ, they haven't taken that lesson that the CEO was all-to-eager to read-into the pause. Most understand that pro-active harm done has to be taken far more seriously than harm done by omission, that the trust in the vaccine system is important to many vaccines across many diseases and decades.
The Line is certainly, um, diverse this week. One rant about how WE were the stupid ones to trust Doug Ford to do anything, it's all on us; another about how the public are the dumb ones that need the most-careful statements at all times from public health.
There have been bad calls but everybody I talk to knows the larger story: stay away from people, stay away from their breath. All the rest falls out from that.
This article pairs nicely with last week's dispatch. The public health experts sound like they are talking to children because the press has enabled them to for the last year.
Imagine if public health officials had met questions like this since March 2020:
"Quarantining healthy citizens was not included in any provincial or federal pandemic response framework. What data do you have about the benefits of this? And the harms? How can you be confident that this will be of such substantial benefit to the public that it justifies the unprecedented and indefinite suspension of numerous Charter Rights?"
Or, "How come you continue to report the case fatality rate rather than the infection fatality rate? Aren't you concerned that that will make it harder for Canadians to judge a commensurate pandemic response? I think Canadians can understand that there are many people who are getting the virus who don't go and get tested.
Etc.
If public health officials had been cutting their teeth on questions like that last spring, they'd have their message clearer now.
I hope someone can help me. I linked to the CBC article that is supposed to show that “National Advisory Committee on Vaccinations determines that the risk from the AstraZeneca vaccine to those same individuals is higher than the virus itself?” but I cannot find a statement like that in the article anywhere. What am I missing?
To our understanding, that may only be true for the 20-29 cohort; and that's because the risk to them of COVID is already extraordinarily small, barring pre-existing conditions.
Hi Ed - I take it as implicit that, if NACI indicates that people 16-55 should not take the AZ vaccine - and there are no other vaccines available to those people for a period of some months - then NACI views their potential infection during that time period as less risky than their risk of blood clot from the vaccine itself. This is visible in the argumentation presented by NACI itself: that people over 55 should take the AZ vaccine because their risk of death from COVID is sufficiently high to offset risk of adverse events.
Thanks for the responses. First off, when I clicked on the link I was taken to:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/astrazeneca-under-55-1.5968128
I copied the entire article, put it into a Libreoffice document and did a search for cohort. The only reference the search got was “Speaking to reporters in Niagara Falls, Ont., Ontario Premier Doug Ford said today that the province would follow NACI's guidance and reserve the current supply of AstraZeneca for those in the older cohort.” - so I can only conclude that we are looking at different articles.
Second. My reading of the article is substantively different than your own. To me it is a cautionary in nature. Key to me are the following
“AstraZeneca issued a statement this evening saying that it respects the decision by NACI and noting that Health Canada's guidance on the vaccine has not changed since last week.
"Regulatory authorities in the U.K., European Union, the World Health Organization and Health Canada have concluded that the benefits of using our vaccine to protect people from this deadly virus significantly outweigh the risks across all adult age groups," said AstraZeneca spokesperson Carlo Mastrangelo in the statement.”
, “"This is something that is very rare and we need to continue to monitor it," said Dr. Supriya Sharma, Health Canada's chief medical adviser, adding this is a sign that Canada has a robust monitoring system.
"It's reasonable to pause for a period of time while this continues to be evaluated," she said. "I fully understand this can be confusing."
Recognizing that there might be some relationship between AztrZenica and blood clotting, there were a number of possible avenues forward for health officials. First, don’t inform anyone and carry on as they were, second, let people know and say that there might be a link but we are assuming that it isn’t much of an issue and so we will carry on with the status quo, third, we don’t think that this is a significant issue but we think it prudent to pause until we have a better understanding, or fourth, etc. possibly a number of other more draconian responses.
The considered options were the second and the third. Your view seems to be that the third option implies that a decision has been made that the potential dangers of the drug outweigh the potential dangers of the disease. While I understand that view, and some official might actually have believed it two weeks ago, I believe that it ignores a very significant factor. Getting a jab involves trust between the giver and the receiver that whatever risks there might be are known to both. As soon as a potential risk is discovered, but the severity of the risk is not satisfactorily determined, an accurate risk assessment cannot be given. Without that, the trust factor is undermined.
The article cited is two weeks old. If you go to the Alberta website today https://www.alberta.ca/covid19-vaccine.aspx you should find, among others, the following statements:
Get vaccinated as soon as you can, no matter what vaccine is provided.
At this time:
• AstraZeneca is recommended for people under 64 who are less at risk of developing severe illness.
• Moderna and Pfizer are being prioritized for people most at risk of severe outcomes, due to limited supply.
I also don’t think that the statement that you make, “there are no other vaccines available to those people for a period of some months - then NACI views their potential infection during that time period as less risky than their risk of blood clot from the vaccine itself” is a given. The above statements illustrate that your months timeline has not proven accurate. In addition, if you click on the “Phase 2B” link on the above, you will see that anyone from 16 + with health complications is now eligible to be vaccinated. (considering the above bullets, I infer that they will receive either Moderna or Pfizer)
Over the last few days, it appears that TheLine has taken on the task of undermining faith in our health care system as it is attempting to deal with the Pandemic. Because the situation has been a fluid one for a long time this is relatively easy to do, especially when the evidence used is selective and interpreted to advance a particular narrative.
Doing so is, of course, your prerogative. As far as I can tell, your purpose is to show readers how health officials and the media shouldn’t simply be taken at face value. In my view, that is a reasonable goal. If it is not done with a degree of caution, however, there is a predictable externality. It provides justification for those who want to close their ears to anything that health officials have to say. I hope that that is not your actual intent.
Like everything in Canada right now, it has been politicized. After all Health Care is run by Government regardless of mass incompetence and waste. The media has been politicized and has become a voice for the government to spread their message. The internet has been politicized and again there is but one message allowed. It is beginning to feel a whole lot like a totalitarian regime just as they have in China. Forced incarceration or stay at home measures with consequences should you disobey. Soon forced vaccination or one will not be able to travel. Its beginning to get extremely frightening. Now they speak of a guaranteed income to which all Canadians pay for but the government will be controlling. Meaning they have the power to stop payment should you disagree with the way things are moving in Canada. I would suspect we would be handing them complete control over whether we eat or obey. Canada and Canadians frighten me due to their passive dominance by government and the ideal being pushed that they know best. That statement is the furthest thing from truth I have heard to date. Freedom comes at a price and many men and women died for us to have it. Its given up on the ideal that the government will care for you. Its the last thing Government will do. They have not the knowledge or respect for humanity and care only about power and control.
Thank you.