> I guess when you're up against anti-vax fear mongering, you need to fight fire with fire.
That's completely unfair, in this case. The vaccine in question was associated with an increase in deaths in some subgroups (vs control), and overall low effectiveness in the phase 3 clinical trials.
A 13% decrease in mortality in this study is actually quite good given what was expected, but it is in no way "fear mongering" to question the safety/efficacy balance, even now. For example, you'd likely never administer this vaccine outside of high-risk populations. The fact that the safety signals "went away" in this trial is likely more indicative of the baseline risk of the population than any change in the vaccine itself.
Where is this line? Hard to say, but just for the sake of argument: anyone suggesting that we add this to mandatory vaccination schedules in the US would be a total lunatic. Should it be widely used outside of the worst parts of Africa, where malnutrition and preventable childhood illness are rampant? Again, hard to say.
Vaccines are not automatically good, and it isn't "anti-vax fear mongering" to question a particular vaccine. We have to test them, and see if the rewards are greater than the risks in the populations where we intend to use them.
I think a lot of people simply ignore the basic fact that vaccines aren't safe by nature, they have to be proven to be safe through very very rigorous processes.
Anti-vaxxers might come across as a lunatic but their extreme behaviour does not make opposite is true by default.
"The fact that the safety signals "went away" in this trial is likely more indicative of the baseline risk of the population than any change in the vaccine itself" - or just the fact that sometimes, a study can give the wrong signal, the same way it can happen you land a coin three times heads in a row and yet the coin isn't biased...
That's completely unfair, in this case. The vaccine in question was associated with an increase in deaths in some subgroups (vs control), and overall low effectiveness in the phase 3 clinical trials.
A 13% decrease in mortality in this study is actually quite good given what was expected, but it is in no way "fear mongering" to question the safety/efficacy balance, even now. For example, you'd likely never administer this vaccine outside of high-risk populations. The fact that the safety signals "went away" in this trial is likely more indicative of the baseline risk of the population than any change in the vaccine itself.
Where is this line? Hard to say, but just for the sake of argument: anyone suggesting that we add this to mandatory vaccination schedules in the US would be a total lunatic. Should it be widely used outside of the worst parts of Africa, where malnutrition and preventable childhood illness are rampant? Again, hard to say.
Vaccines are not automatically good, and it isn't "anti-vax fear mongering" to question a particular vaccine. We have to test them, and see if the rewards are greater than the risks in the populations where we intend to use them.