4 ms·

I'm a software developer. It has been years since I did anything even remotely scientific. I do not like conspiracy theories. I do not adhere to any that I'm a

I'm a software developer. It has been years since I did anything even remotely scientific. I do not like conspiracy theories. I do not adhere to any that I'm aware of. Yet after reading the abstract, I'm left despairing. Just between the sample size and the glaring discrepancies in the sampling methodology before and after - so massive that they had to be mentioned in the abstract, and I'm left wondering who this is supposed to convince. Sometimes conspiracy theory fighters are their own worst enemies.

elif 5y ago
This is not an axiomatic proof. It is a sanity check and for that it is sufficient. If you require "convincing" in this instance then infact you do adhere. But that's okay.
- jaywalk 5y ago
  > If you require "convincing" in this instance then infact you do adhere. It is not a conspiracy theory to believe that a relatively untested vaccine can have unknown side effects. The FDA just added a heart inflammation warning a few days ago, for example.
  - JoeAltmaier 5y ago
    The vaccine was normally tested for side effects. That's why it took so long. The step that was skipped was the efficacy testing. Not safety testing. The efficacy was proved in the field.
    - codeflow2202 5y ago
      When you sign to get your vaccine it's clearly stated that long term side effects are unknown (at least in Europe). We can only hope it's gonna be ok.
    - jaywalk 5y ago
      You're incorrect. The accelerated timelines for testing the vaccines could not have allowed for the normal amount of safety testing: https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/vaccines/timeline https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/vaccines/timeline
  - revax 5y ago
    >It is not a conspiracy theory to believe that a relatively untested vaccine can have unknown side effects. Everybody knows that. But the benefits (reduced transmission, protection from severe forms of the disease) still outweigh the risks of the vaccine.
    - jaywalk 5y ago
      I don't think everybody knows that. I think a lot of facts have been brushed under the rug to convince more people to get the vaccine. I don't disagree about the benefits of the vaccine outweighing the risks (in many cases) but I don't think most people have the full picture.
    - jsmcgd 5y ago
      It's impossible to say what the risk/reward trade-off is, if all the risks aren't known.
      - michaelmrose 5y ago
        That is nonsense. We approved it for emergency use based on a tentative analysis of the risk reward trade off. With hundreds of millions of shots given there is no particular reason to believe there should be ANY long term consequence of the covid vaccine and short term side effects are understood.
        jsmcgd 5y ago
        I don't know how you can dispute that if you are trying to compute A where A = B/C and you don't have a fixed value for B, then you cannot know A with any certainty. We're distributing novel vaccines treatments which have had zero long term tests. We are all in the middle of the worlds largest vaccine experiment. The final results will not be known for years. Particularly there are actually plenty of reasons to believe there might be lots of long term consequences. Especially for coronavirus vaccines: - previous attempts to make coronavirus vaccines often made people more susceptible to subsequent variants not less through ADE (antibody dependent enhancement) where the virus uses the immune system to infect more cells - long term testing used to be an essential part of vaccine approval, presumably not for no reason - distributing multiple novel vaccines increases the chance that a harmful one will have been distributed (albeit to fewer people than just administering one novel vaccine) - distributing a vaccines during (not before) a pandemic almost guarantees increased virulence (much like administering incomplete courses of antibiotics promotes antibiotic resistant bacteria) - unlike other vaccines, the active ingredient - the spike protein - is toxic. The vaccines make your cells produce this protein and it accumulates in bone marrow and especially the ovaries. The long term effect of this is to be determined - vaccination can make the immune system hyperfocused on a specific variant, increasing vulnerability against other variants There is also the issue of accute vacine injury, but I'll not go into that. Immunology appears to be one of the most complex systems to try and contend with. I'm not an expert, but I worry that the 'tentative analysis' may have not been sufficient. Hopefully it was the right decision to vaccinate the entire western world with novel vaccines. Time will tell.
charles_f 5y ago
Sample size is small because research is expensive and done iteratively. Were it that an effect may be found, a larger study would probably be conducted to understand the exact effect. As such nothing of note was found, and this creates no incentive to conduct deeper research
spamizbad 5y ago
This is pretty normal. You have to run multiple studies before you can draw any conclusions. The studies start small, and if they find anything of note, there are bigger, more expensive follow-up studies. This is a good reason why you shouldn't draw conclusions from just 1 study, or even 2 studies. You need a significant body of scientific evidence before you can conclusively say "X causes Y"
iNane9000 5y ago
It seems like a quick easy study, not trying to be more than it is. Why not gather some data before and after. That said, jama could do more to protect its reputation.

elif 5y ago

This is not an axiomatic proof. It is a sanity check and for that it is sufficient. If you require "convincing" in this instance then infact you do adhere. But that's okay.

jaywalk 5y ago
> If you require "convincing" in this instance then infact you do adhere. It is not a conspiracy theory to believe that a relatively untested vaccine can have unknown side effects. The FDA just added a heart inflammation warning a few days ago, for example.
- JoeAltmaier 5y ago
  The vaccine was normally tested for side effects. That's why it took so long. The step that was skipped was the efficacy testing. Not safety testing. The efficacy was proved in the field.
  - codeflow2202 5y ago
    When you sign to get your vaccine it's clearly stated that long term side effects are unknown (at least in Europe). We can only hope it's gonna be ok.
  - jaywalk 5y ago
    You're incorrect. The accelerated timelines for testing the vaccines could not have allowed for the normal amount of safety testing: https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/vaccines/timeline https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/vaccines/timeline
- revax 5y ago
  >It is not a conspiracy theory to believe that a relatively untested vaccine can have unknown side effects. Everybody knows that. But the benefits (reduced transmission, protection from severe forms of the disease) still outweigh the risks of the vaccine.
  - jaywalk 5y ago
    I don't think everybody knows that. I think a lot of facts have been brushed under the rug to convince more people to get the vaccine. I don't disagree about the benefits of the vaccine outweighing the risks (in many cases) but I don't think most people have the full picture.
  - jsmcgd 5y ago
    It's impossible to say what the risk/reward trade-off is, if all the risks aren't known.
    - michaelmrose 5y ago
      That is nonsense. We approved it for emergency use based on a tentative analysis of the risk reward trade off. With hundreds of millions of shots given there is no particular reason to believe there should be ANY long term consequence of the covid vaccine and short term side effects are understood.
      - jsmcgd 5y ago
        I don't know how you can dispute that if you are trying to compute A where A = B/C and you don't have a fixed value for B, then you cannot know A with any certainty. We're distributing novel vaccines treatments which have had zero long term tests. We are all in the middle of the worlds largest vaccine experiment. The final results will not be known for years. Particularly there are actually plenty of reasons to believe there might be lots of long term consequences. Especially for coronavirus vaccines: - previous attempts to make coronavirus vaccines often made people more susceptible to subsequent variants not less through ADE (antibody dependent enhancement) where the virus uses the immune system to infect more cells - long term testing used to be an essential part of vaccine approval, presumably not for no reason - distributing multiple novel vaccines increases the chance that a harmful one will have been distributed (albeit to fewer people than just administering one novel vaccine) - distributing a vaccines during (not before) a pandemic almost guarantees increased virulence (much like administering incomplete courses of antibiotics promotes antibiotic resistant bacteria) - unlike other vaccines, the active ingredient - the spike protein - is toxic. The vaccines make your cells produce this protein and it accumulates in bone marrow and especially the ovaries. The long term effect of this is to be determined - vaccination can make the immune system hyperfocused on a specific variant, increasing vulnerability against other variants There is also the issue of accute vacine injury, but I'll not go into that. Immunology appears to be one of the most complex systems to try and contend with. I'm not an expert, but I worry that the 'tentative analysis' may have not been sufficient. Hopefully it was the right decision to vaccinate the entire western world with novel vaccines. Time will tell.

charles_f 5y ago

Sample size is small because research is expensive and done iteratively. Were it that an effect may be found, a larger study would probably be conducted to understand the exact effect. As such nothing of note was found, and this creates no incentive to conduct deeper research

spamizbad 5y ago

This is pretty normal. You have to run multiple studies before you can draw any conclusions. The studies start small, and if they find anything of note, there are bigger, more expensive follow-up studies. This is a good reason why you shouldn't draw conclusions from just 1 study, or even 2 studies. You need a significant body of scientific evidence before you can conclusively say "X causes Y"

iNane9000 5y ago

It seems like a quick easy study, not trying to be more than it is. Why not gather some data before and after. That said, jama could do more to protect its reputation.