I typically like to begin with some get-to-know-you questions. Please share a bit about who you are, where you are from, and what your passions are in life. I've been a software engineer for almost a decade. I've earned multiple certifications from Microsoft, am part of a special "insiders" group at Microsoft that has about 4000 members worldwide (which gives me direct access to their employees, secret stuff they are working on, etc.) and I've authored a technical book on a certain programming language. My job involves lots of thinking and technical "stuff": technical problem solving, reviewing the work of my colleagues, writing and reading technical documentation (LOTS of reading!), helping to hire new engineers, etc. I have written many technical articles for well-known companies in the industry. I mention these things to point out that I am skilled at understanding complex technical concepts. I am very good at reading technical content very quickly and understanding the "meat" of the document. This comes in handy when reviewing literature in the medical field. Currently you have been posting peer-reviewed articles on the topic of covid and the vaccine. Just so that we are on the same page, can you explain what a peer-reviewed article is and what its significance is? A peer-reviewed article is a medical/scientific study that has been published and the "article" is a summarization of their research and study. When published in medical journals, there is an editorial process where multiple editors who are also competent in the medical field review the articles to make sure the method of their study, the data they used, etc. make sense. A peer-reviewed study provides the reader with a trust that it's been vetted and meets certain technical standards. This doesn't mean the document and its conclusions are true, but to figure that out the reader needs to dig into the content. What motivated you to study these peer-reviewed articles? I love digging into the Bible and love learning about apologetics, historical events that help understand the Bible, etc. One of the things I've done in my private studies is to take a topic and look at the historical references that support the event, person, place, etc. Instead of just taking someone else's word, I love finding the primary sources and finding out what, as a whole, they have to "say". For example, I've taken a bunch of ancient references about Jesus written by non-Christians (like ancient historians and writers) and combined them all to see what "picture" they tell. It's very close to what the Bible says. I've gone through the book of Acts and found dozens of ancient documents that shed light on the people, places and events in a way that verifies the reliability of the biblical documents. Likewise, on the topic of COVID vaccines, in particular, I'm interested in hearing what experts have to say. But more than that, I'm most interested in reading what the primary sources around cutting-edge research and studies have to tell us. What's the picture they are presenting when combined as a whole? In doing this, any conclusions that I come to believe are founded upon the most trusted scientific literature available today - instead of believing what politicians and government-sponsored media are promoting. As a software engineer, one of the ideas that are a staple in designing and building information systems is that solutions that work in controlled environments can often act totally different in the real world. Entire books have been written on this topic and how software engineers, specifically, can better defend against this. In the same way, testing vaccines in a controlled environment is potentially totally different than mass vaccination into an active pandemic. The heavy-handed and simplistic approach of "just vaccinate everyone" reminds me of solutions I've seen in my field which have completely failed when pushed into the real world, while they seemed to work fine in the controlled "test" environments. All these conclusions about the vaccines and the virus affect us in real ways. For example, if people are believing that unvaccinated people are more likely to carry COVID than vaccinated people they might treat unvaccinated people differently. As you'll see, that is not what the literature has found. According to the current findings, vaccinated people should be more worried about other vaccinated people since they will be more likely to carry vaccine-resistant strains! What have you been learning from them? Well, a lot! I'll try to lay out the general conclusion that I'm seeing on some of the specific issues around vaccinations. One of my greatest concerns is the fact that we are mass vaccinating people without having any long-term data on side effects. Now, after we've mass vaccinated, studies are coming out with very concerning findings, such as:
On the issue of whether the vaccines are reducing the spread of COVID in real-world populations (remember my comments about lab vs. real-world environments?):
One the issue of whether or not the vaccines help to decrease the likelihood that someone will die from being infected with COVID:
There's another concern around whether unvaccinated people are causing variants or not. Medical studies are currently showing the opposite: vaccinated populations are causing variants. This is a well known fact in the field:
Before showing some more studies around COVID vaccines, in particular, there's a distinction that is helpful to point out. Vaccines generally have what is called "sterilizing immunity" - they protect you from becoming infected with a virus. The COVID vaccines in use today are not sterilizing vaccines. They don't prevent infection and therefore they still allow the spread of the virus. They only prevent severe disease. This is an important difference, as the following studies point out.
On the same topic, I want to end with a quote from a study published in The Lancet. The Lancet is one of the most prestigious medical journals. This is an extended quote, but I think it drives the overall pattern and conclusion that I've come to: "If substantial immune evasion occurs, current vaccines are likely to still offer some benefit to individuals. At the population level, however, they could induce viral selection and escape, making the prospect of achieving herd immunity increasingly remote. This virological game changer has numerous consequences, not only for vaccines and treatment, but also for prevention and control strategies. The fervently awaited end of this global health crisis might be continually postponed, as new variants emerge and immune evasion reduces vaccination effectiveness in the short and medium term. Hence, it is time to abandon fear-based approaches based on seemingly haphazard stop-start generalised confinement as the main response to the pandemic; approaches which expect citizens to wait patiently until intensive care units are re-enforced, full vaccination is achieved, and herd immunity is reached. Populations have so far been relatively complacent, but their doubts and distrust are visible in protest movements in several countries. The impact of general confinement on entire economies has been devastating, with worse still to come in levels of unemployment and national debt. Social and health (including mental health) consequences are also colossal, in particular for the younger generations, despite them being at low risk in terms of morbidity and mortality from SARS-CoV-2 infection. To best ensure the success of mass vaccination—whatever its hoped-for impact on transmission—and to slow the emergence of new variants, while avoiding general confinement, governments need to integrate and apply available measures in a way that is much more targeted to different generational groups. Different age groups are not affected similarly by the virus; from March to June, 2020, 96% of additional deaths related to COVID-19 in Europe occurred in patients aged older than 70 years... Using stop-start general confinement as the main response to the COVID-19 pandemic is no longer feasible. Though attractive to many scientists, and a default measure for political leaders fearing legal liability for slow or indecisive national responses, its use must be revisited, only to be used as a last resort. We scientists working against COVID-19 must have the courage to address those in power, who bear ultimate responsibility for the policies chosen and their consequences. If this responsibility is shirked or delayed, the inevitable day of reckoning might be terrible." A concerning thing that comes from taking all of these studies together is answering the question "What happens if the virus mutates to the point of becoming vaccine-resistant?" Does that mean the vaccines won't help at all anymore? In the end, would it be better to be unvaccinated and have a more broad natural immune response to the full virus instead of only the vaccine-induced immunity that is "focussed on a single protein such as SARS-CoV-2 Spike" as one study put it? In the last study I quoted above from The Lancet, this is why they state "At the population level, however, they could induce viral selection and escape, making the prospect of achieving herd immunity increasingly remote." Reaching herd immunity would be impossible because the vaccines won't be effective anymore. With so much info being labelled as "misinformation", how can I know which studies are reliable? Again, I think one needs to look at a breadth of studies and articles, and then see if you can come to some conclusions. At the very least, the conclusion right now is that we don't know enough about the long-term effects of (a) mass vaccination with leaky vaccines and (b) the potential long-term side effects of these particular mRNA vaccines. The most concerning studies have only been coming out in the last couple of months since we don't have long-term data. Try to find out what the actual scientists doing the work "on the ground" are finding instead of the pop-culture heroes and politicians. One final question as we come to the end of the interview. How does the info you learn impact the way you engage with what is happening today? Again, having built my conclusions from the primary sources gives me confidence that I know that my position is rational and sensible. There's an obvious chasm between what you hear on mainstream media & by most people and the actual science being done in the relevant fields. At best, if all the studies I've highlighted (cause there are many more!) are false then mass vaccination will work out in the end and there won't be any serious long-term side effects. If any one of the points I highlighted is true, then we have huge issues coming... History is full of instances when the masses were wrong about science and other issues. The Bible makes it clear that humanity is often prideful in falsely thinking it is overly intelligent and wise. Proverbs 11:2 says "When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom." My advice is to heed Proverbs 8:12, "I, wisdom, dwell together with prudence; I possess knowledge and discretion." Wisdom, prudence (e.g. being careful concerning the future) and discretion always stick together
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