The message on conservative media is that COVID vaccines are risky and of questionable value.
Moreover, tyrants are forcing it on you. Of course you are angry.
[H]ow effective overall are these vaccines? The headlines have shifted over the past 18 months. And look at these numbers. We have gone from implications that the vaccine was 100 percent effective to 90 percent, to 70 percent, to 60 percent, to 50 percent. … This does not inspire much confidence.
One vivid anecdote like the death of fully-vaccinated Colin Powell, is easier to grasp than are the statistics of COVID deaths, especially when the statistics are presented misleadingly. College classmate Eliot Nierman, M.D. is a physician and Professor of Clinical Medicine at a University of Pennsylvania's Perelman School of Medicine. He read this blog and Tucker Carlson's words yesterday and sent a comment that helps explain how it is Carlson might be so misleading about vaccine effectiveness.
Eliot sent me this note:
Interesting idea to talk of [medical people] as fiduciaries. You might also have talked about religious leaders. One could make the argument that media leaders should be as well.
As for what Carlson said, the issue is misuse of statistics and using a singles case an anecdote to prove something. He is of course the liar and manipulator The chances of dying unvaccinated are at least 10 times higher than vaccinated. Yes that means that some vaccinated people die. And yes that means that if most people are vaccinated, as many who die of covid may in fact be vaccinated.Assume for example, that 90% of elderly are vaccinated (true in some locations) and the chances of dying unvaccinated and elderly are 1/10 that of dying vaccinated. Assume your chances of dying from covid if you are unvaccinated are 0.1 % (1/1,000). The chance of dying vaccinated are 0.01% (1/10,000). Take 1 million elderly people. 900,000 are vaccinated, 100,000 are not. Of the unvaccinated 100 die. Of the vaccinated 90 die. Hmmm, close to the figure in Maryland of 40%. (actually higher at 47%)Anyone who wants to bet with me and give me 10x odds when the odds should be even count me in!
Eliot graduated from college summa cum laude in physics, and the college is very stingy giving out summas. It is possible that his comment needs a moment's translation and repetition. As is predictable, the pool of people who are most vaccinated are the people who understood themselves to be most at risk, the elderly and ill. They are the people most likely to die of something, especially if there is a complication from COVID, as in the case of Colin Powell. There is also a pool of people who have, so far, not gotten vaccinated--a pool that includes a large number of people who are young and healthy, and who consider themselves invulnerable. A small percentage of people in both groups get COVID and get very sick.
As the pool of highly vulnerable people get vaccinated and grows to approach 90% of the population, and the pool of unvaccinated shrinks, then even the rare instances of hospitalization and death from the huge pool of the vaccinated turns out to be a bigger number than much-greater percentage of illnesses from the smaller pool. Moreover, not only are the sizes of the pool different, but the age and risk profile of people in the pools are different; the vaccinated group was older and less healthy to begin with. So the absolute number of deaths from the large and small pools might be equal.
Properly understood, this is strong evidence for vaccination. Being vaccinated is as good or better than being young and healthy!
When reported misleadingly, as Tucker Carlson did, that near equal numbers of people die--vaccinated or un-vaccinated--it implies that vaccinations are of little value. It leaves out the most important thing: The size and makeup of the pool of people in each group.Possibly Eliot's explanation was as clear or clearer than my repeat, but we may hear the Fox message more often as the U.S. makes progress on getting people vaccinated. Head's up: if and when everyone is vaccinated, there will still be a very few people who get sick and die with COVID as a complication, and at that point everyone who dies will have been vaccinated. Don't be surprised when that gets reported. Vaccinations don't make people immortal. They do make people much less likely to get sick and die.
11 comments:
Spreading disinformation about a pandemic and vaccines pretty much epitomizes what “conservatism” and the GOP have degenerated into. But their character is best revealed by the leader of the Republican Party’s eulogy for Powell:
“Wonderful to see Colin Powell, who made big mistakes on Iraq and famously, so-called weapons of mass destruction, be treated in death so beautifully by the Fake News Media. Hope that happens to me someday, He was a classic RINO, if even that, always being the first to attack other Republicans. He made plenty of mistakes, but anyway, may he rest in peace!"
OMG, math!
Here's the thing. When reasonably smart people read a statistic, they are able to factor themselves into the data; "If the odds of x are this, then my risk is such", and so on.
This requires a baseline knowledge of the World, reality, that is beyond their own direct experience, in this instance some science education. I suppose we must blame public schools for failing to teach every student the basics, but it's also possible that some are uneducable, or by the time they reach the classroom they have tragically closed their minds due to parental conditioning.
One example is the Lottery, where the majority who play waste their money against impossible odds. COVID is a lottery also.
Feelin' lucky?
It seems many commenters fail to appreciate the power of tribal world views. I live near Seattle and most people I talk to follow the rules of logic presented here, i.e. that valid, empirical scientific data is a good tool for decision-making. Especially for the complex and high-stakes kind.
But I got a different view last weekend. I was at a 500 acre cattle ranch in Eastern Washington where the population density averages 17 people per square mile. There are billboards warning people to watch their children and pets because of the prevalence of predators. People carry guns. Trump signs and bumper stickers are everywhere. The people I met were sweet and kind and resourceful-kind-of-smart. The family has made their living off that patch of land for almost 100 years, raising feed crops like oats and wheat and alfalfa, and raising dairy and beef cattle. They are proud of what they see as their grit and self-sufficiency. And nobody should tell them what to do - especially the government. I found myself admiring their pluck and instincts for survival as much as I was disheartened by their cult-like trust in Fox and Trump. Those bow-shot comments by Carlson are mighty powerful in maintaining that view. These are not stupid people, and they are the kind who are likely too proud to admit they were wrong. But who among us truly is?
How does following a cult leader and his propaganda machine fit in with being self reliant? I don’t get it.
I am sure the cattle ranchers follow the relevant science related to raising cattle. If not they would fail. The real question is how to get them to apply their smarts to issues of vaccination and masking rather than succumbing to fanatical, self serving liars?
Art
They don't see themselves as cult followers of course. They struck me as more Libertarian and DJT's message of distrust of institutions in general resonated with them, and given their news feed, they never thought that an autocrat would be worse than they could imagine for free agency.
Eliot
I think you've got a point. They trust their own data, or data from people they trust. They actually said they think that maybe there might be something to "this climate thing". They could only produce 1300 out of a usual 10,000 bales of alfalfa, and they had to sell 100 head of cattle they couldn't afford to feed.
John C. I have cousins who sound like your friends, a ranch about that size, in a County which refuses to accept that it's located in California, and facing the drought head on. I think the Climate is going to hit a lot of these folks like a train coming through a tunnel.
All those great liberal scientific minds in Seattle think that a man can cut-off his penis, and call himself a woman. It's as if all a woman is is a man without a penis. Men will never have the genes to be a woman. Liberals follow science only when it agrees with their agenda.
It sounds like Curt's mind (to use the term loosely) is being manipulated. He needs to remember his tinfoil codpiece in order to protect his brain.
I will leave up the "Peter's Principle" comment. It is done in the classic Curt Ankerberg style: Fake name, attention to a limp or missing penis, off topic, Trump-ish. I have tried leaving other Ankerberg-style comments up, when it was obvious they were iterations of him (or an excellent mimic) but people have advised me it is a little like finding dog poop on my front doorstep. It would obviously be dog poop, so a reflection on the dog and its owner and not on me, but it unwelcome nastiness for a visitor to encounter. Clean up Ankerberg the same way you would clean up dog poop, by removing it.
I leave this likely-Ankerberg comment iteration up so readers can have a sense of Ankerberg or a mimic. He has become famous locally for obscene and harassing social media posts. People can google his name and "Angrybird," and get a good dose of stories in the local newspaper about his filing false tax returns and his amusing defense that he was severely brain damaged, a mental disability that leads to fraudulent behavior.
Curt apparently reads this blog. He is not stupid. He has the capacity to write interesting, probing comments on local and national matters, which I have probably published here. He has sharp insights on the local Chamber of Commerce, and he has the capacity to write intelligent, grammatically correct, and even persuasive comments. Apparently he chooses not to do this.. Instead, he chooses to be a kind of vandal, writing repeatedly on a curious obsession, my penis (presumably limp or missing) and on sex with children (which he attributes to every male except himself.)
So the pattern is complete: Curt Ankerberg or an imposter drives readership to this blog by commenting, but does so expressing odd fixations. Some readers tell me they find his comments amusing in their transparent obsessions and the bad light they shine on Trump and the GOP. (Look at the typical Trump supporter!) When comments are particularly obscene or foolish, I delete them. Then, to put them into context of who Ankerberg is, I remind readers that he has been found to be a fraudulent tax cheat (a bad finding for an accountant) and that he admits to a mental disability that excuses him from his anti-social behavior. Since he chooses to vandalize the comments section, I will remind people that Ankerberg is a frequent local candidate for office and a Trump-supporter found guilty of fraudulently cheating taxpayers who admits to a mental disability that explains his anti-social behavior. So voters beware, and Trump supporters can hide their heads.
People have asked me off-line: Why doesn't Curt write normal, useful comments that might stay up? Why does a guy with the smarts to make a strong case instead choose to write nasty troll comments? And what is his deal being so weirdly interested in your penis and in sex with children?
The answer is, I don't know. I have no information about his sexual interests, other than what he writes here. If he chooses to be a "comment vandal" and an embarrassment to the GOP and Trump, I should let him do his his thing, people tell me: Curt Ankerberg, a typical Trump supporter and GOP candidate. If a person promoting Trump goes door to door dropping pro-Trump literature, but chooses to do it by putting a pile of dog poop on it so it doesn't blow away in the breeze, Democrats should let him continue. He vandalizes himself, Trump, and the GOP more than he vandalizes this blog.
Uh, those ranchers who act very self-reliant likely get a lot of government subsidies.
They hate government but don't hesitate taking its money (which comes from us taxpayers).
They are against federal ownership of land but wouldn't be able to afford the cost to graze on private land.
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