Dr. Paul Offit, a vaccinologist, spoke of his conversation with Dr Fauci regarding whether the US government should target high-risk groups with COVID boosters rather than the entire population. Fauci replied that the correct action was to target high-risk groups. However, this becomes a nuanced message that the public may not understand. So, to ensure the high-risk groups get vaccinated, it was necessary to recommend it for everybody.
Dr. Fauci was willing to sacrifice truth for the sake of messaging. He was willing to expose children to a risk of adverse effects from an unneeded vaccination to get more shots into the arms of more high-risk patients. This reverses societal and ethical norms in which adults should be expected to protect children.
The dumbing down of information can be contagious. It can be dangerous. It is always condescending. Public confidence in the CDC and its vaccination schedule has tanked. Vaccines, antibiotics, anesthesia, and sanitation are among history's most significant health inventions. However, we are seeing a sharp increase in general vaccine hesitancy. Americans have cause to mistrust public health advice from the government and academia, given the lies they were fed about social distancing, lockdowns, masking, and shutting down schools.
Elderly people are encouraged to receive the influenza vaccine to prevent hospitalizations and death. A 2020 Annals of Internal Medicine study of 9.6 million patient years of data collected between 2000 and 2014 showed no decrease in hospitalization or mortality rates in vaccinated patients over 65.
A 2024 Journal of Infectious Diseases study examined the effects of annual influenza vaccination in five U. S. Locations. This included 8 years and 55,728 people. People receiving annual influenza vaccinations were more likely to become infected with an influenza virus than those not getting vaccinated.
Limited protection of the flu vaccine may reflect the reality that there is not only one viral respiratory agent called Influenza. It is convenient to group influenza and influenza-like illness – a syndrome caused by 200-odd known and many unknown microorganisms – and call it all the flu. In a Cochrane review, only 11% of “flu” diagnoses were caused by the influenza virus.
There is a small distance between disinformation and incomplete information offered without context. It is the distance between truth and half-truth. This distance reflects two opposing philosophies of human nature.
The first view holds that man can be scientifically molded for his own good. Social engineering becomes a logical project of this view. Free speech is valuable only if it educates the public in a way that aligns with the “clerisy’s” version of reason and truth.
The opposite vision holds that free speech is part of a right to liberty and property, which the government should protect. This perspective imparts trust in the public to discern what is best given their own circumstances.
Can the CDC and Public Health regain public trust? I’m not convinced there will be sufficient humility on their part for this to occur any time soon. This is what would be required:
Acknowledge the mistakes that were made. Be honest with the American public.
Accept that nuance matters and that Americans are not too stupid to understand. They make nuanced decisions every day. Shared decision-making, considering individual health risks and goals, expresses respect. Patients want truth, not dumbed-down patriarchal mandates.
Stratify their recommendations. Most medical professional organizations do this.
Class I: A strong recommendation for which benefits far exceed risk for most patients
Class IIa: A moderate recommendation for which benefits usually exceed risk for most patients
Class IIb: A weak recommendation for which benefits of therapy are less certain
Class III: Therapy is not recommended.
Placing recommendations into categories makes political leaders less likely to turn Class II recommendations into universal mandates.
4. Grade evidence for recommendations:
Level of Evidence (LOE) A: High-quality evidence from two or more random controlled trials
LOE B-R: Moderate quality evidence from one or more RCTs
LOE B-NR: Moderate quality evidence from nonrandomized studies
LOEC-LD: Studies with limitations of design or execution in human subjects
LOE C-EO: Consensus of expert opinion based on clinical experience.
5. All guidance should be authored. Placing one’s name and professional reputation behind a health recommendation, rather than hiding behind the name of an agency, makes it personal and holds them accountable.
6. Minimize and make conflicts of interest transparent. To begin with, the CDC should disallow anyone with financial relationships with the vaccine industry from participating in its Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices. The revolving door between high-level CDC positions and the pharmaceutical industry must be closed.
7. Stop talking about “misinformation.” This term was weaponized to marginalize doctors and scientists who disagreed with US government health policies. The CDC can assert what it believes to be facts, but there must be an allowance for discussion and debate to play out in public forums and the medical scientific community.
8. Respect the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System to identify safety signals. By March 2023, there were over 19,000 deaths after covid inoculations reported to VAERS. Most of these deaths occurred within 48-72 hours of receiving the vaccine. The CDC urged the public to ignore the astounding numbers in this database, which they jointly manage with the FDA, insisting the shots are “safe and effective.” Challenging the accuracy of VAERS data to defend the safety of the shots calls into question the purpose of their own database.
9.. The CDC needs to convene an independent expert panel to review the mistakes made and craft a statement of ethical principles to guide future CDC and public health actions. This statement should affirm the critical importance of informed consent with freedom of choice, respect for individual rights, avoidance of censorship and fear-based messaging, and a commitment to openly acknowledging the unknowns and harms of the interventions.
10. Recognize and respect the need to appreciate alternative moral viewpoints of patients and fellow practitioners. While conscience is important, there is a danger of emphasizing a universal position of ethics and neglecting tradition-specific systems that often provide more robust interpretations of ethical scenarios.
Frederic Bastiat’s (1801-1850) most famous work is The Law, the key theme of which examines what happens to a society when the law becomes a weapon of those in power rather than a tool to protect the rights and freedoms of individuals. This quote is included:
When misguided public opinion honors what is despicable, despises what is honorable, punishes virtue and rewards vice, encourages what is harmful and discourages what is useful, applauds falsehood, and smothers truth under indifference or insult, a nation turns its back on progress. It can be restored only by the terrible lessons of catastrophe.
The catastrophe has come. I can only hope we have learned its lessons.
Tim Powell MD