One of my recent posts on the Daily Sceptic was the subject of a ‘fact check‘ by Full Fact, which self-importantly describes itself as “the UK’s independent fact checking organisation” but is in fact funded by Google, Facebook and George Soros, among others, to help them suppress unapproved news and views. Even U.K. broadcasting regulator Ofcom has said it relies on the organisation to tell it what to censor regarding COVID-19, so unfortunately the dog has teeth and can’t just be ignored as one more absurd website with excessive faith in its own infallibility.
The post in question, from September 10th, simply reported on Public Health England’s latest Vaccine Surveillance report, which included infection rates by vaccination status for the previous month so allowed the calculation of an unadjusted estimate of vaccine effectiveness. Full Fact, however, took exception to the idea that vaccine effectiveness can be estimated in this way, because it wasn’t adjusted for confounders. Or used the wrong population data. Or because the article included the (entirely accurate) claim that the PHE report showed higher infection rates in the vaccinated in some age groups. Or because the heading didn’t include ‘caveats’. Or something. In any case, it was ‘incorrect’.
Here follows my correspondence with them, attempting to explain that the factual errors lay entirely in their ‘fact check’, not in my piece.
September 27th 2021
To: The Editor
Incorrect claim that report from Public Health England shows COVID-19 vaccines have “negative effectiveness” in the over-40s: Full Fact correction request
I’m writing to you from Full Fact, the U.K.’s independent fact checking organisation. I have seen an article you published on Friday September 24th so I know you are already aware of a fact check we published earlier last week, but I wanted to send an email to explain why we wrote that fact check.
The article you published on September 10th had the headline “Vaccines Have NEGATIVE Effectiveness in the Over-40s, as Low as MINUS 38%, Shows New PHE Report”
This headline falsely claims that a report from Public Health England (PHE) shows COVID-19 vaccines having “negative effectiveness” in the over-40s. It is not true that the PHE report shows this.
You note in your article that PHE says its data cannot be used on its own as a reliable measurement of vaccine effectiveness. However your headline makes a claim about vaccine effectiveness based on it.
As you will know we have published a fact check on these claims which is available on our website here:
“Vaccines do not raise your risk of catching Covid”
We are asking that you issue a correction on this article in line with the above. We would also ask that you bear this in mind when writing future articles about this data, including the one you published on Friday. We hope our fact check is helpful in this regard.
Please let me know if you’d like to discuss this further.
Many thanks,
Bethan Davies
Policy and Impact Manager
Full Fact
October 5th 2021
Good afternoon,
I just wanted to follow up on an email I sent last week about a fact check we have written on an article you published on 24th September. I will be updating this fact check on our website this week with details of what action we have taken so I wanted to check in with you before I do this. If you are planning to amend this article I’d be very grateful if you could let me know.
Many thanks,
Bethan
October 5th 2021
Dear Bethan
Thank you for your email.
Apologies – I appear to have missed your first email.
As you are aware, I have written in response to your piece ‘fact-checking’ my article of September 10th (here and now also here).
Your piece wrongly implies that people had been confused by PHE’s report as it “seemed to show for the month in question (August 9th to September 5th) that people in their 40s, 50s, 60s and 70s were more likely to test positive for Covid if they had been vaccinated than if they hadn’t”. However, the report doesn’t “seem” to show that, it plainly does show that. Can you explain why your piece attempts to cast doubt on this correct understanding of the data in PHE’s report, and thus misinform the public about the infection risk among vaccinated and unvaccinated people during that month? Will you be amending your piece to ensure it does not confuse or mislead in this way and makes clear that in fact the PHE report does show that vaccinated people in those age groups were more likely to test positive for Covid during that period?
Your piece’s discussion about population estimates is interesting but I hope you will agree that people are entitled to present data and make calculations based on the population data PHE presents in its reports?
You say in your email: “PHE says its data cannot be used on its own as a reliable measurement of vaccine effectiveness.” Those are your words, not theirs. They say: “The vaccination status of cases, inpatients and deaths is not the most appropriate method to assess vaccine effectiveness…” (emphasis added).
However, regardless of what PHE say is the “most appropriate method”, the fact is that vaccine effectiveness is defined as the reduced risk of infection in the vaccinated compared to the unvaccinated (see here). I am clear in the piece that the VE figures given are unadjusted (though they are controlled for age). I explain the limitations of the estimates and address the reason PHE gives for the sample being biased. This is a perfectly valid approach to presenting an estimate of vaccine effectiveness, provided the limitations are clear. It also needs to be kept in mind that studies which do attempt to adjust for various confounders can come with significant problems of their own (see e.g. this and this).
A study in the Lancet published yesterday confirms that vaccine effectiveness has been declining fast against Delta and over time – and that study used data only up to the start of August. This indicates that the VE figures you quote in your ‘fact check’ to counter mine are out of date. The point of estimating unadjusted VE from real-world data is to try to keep up with how vaccines are faring now, not six months ago. We are not trying to denigrate vaccines – that’s why we are sure to make clear their continued effectiveness against serious illness and death. We are only interested in reporting up-to-date factual information about them.
My question for you is why you appear to be attempting to cover over the fact that infection rates in the vaccinated are very high – on PHE data, higher than in the unvaccinated, with the gap increasing week-on-week? Would fact-checking energies not be better spent on those who continue to claim that the vaccines are highly effective against infection, a claim which looks less and less accurate with each passing week?
I would be grateful for confirmation that you have amended your piece to ensure it does not mislead about current infection rates in vaccinated people (according to PHE data) and about the latest vaccine effectiveness estimates.
Kind regards
Will
Will Jones
Associate Editor – Daily Sceptic
October 7th 2021
Dear Will,
Thank you for your response to my email.
We disagree with your point that we have misunderstood the PHE report.
We acknowledge in our fact check that your article mentions PHE’s caveats, but our fact check and the email we sent you initially are related to your headline, which has no caveats in it.
We are happy with information we included on vaccine effectiveness and we have made it clear to readers where this came from.
We very much appreciate you setting out your position. In conclusion however, after consideration, we will not be amending our fact check.
Kind regards,
Bethan
October 7th 2021
Dear Bethan
Thank you for your reply.
You say your ‘fact check’ is related to our headline. Please can you spell out more precisely for me what you object to in the headline? Is it because it doesn’t include the word ‘unadjusted’ before ‘vaccine effectiveness’? Or is it something else? Unadjusted vaccine effectiveness is still a form of vaccine effectiveness so the headline is not inaccurate on that point (and the caveats are explained in the piece). Part of the problem is that you seem to regard vaccine effectiveness as something which can only be calculated in a formal study, rather than a quantity representing the reduced proportion of infections in a vaccinated group versus an unvaccinated group which may be calculated on any such data set (with limitations acknowledged). It is therefore not ‘incorrect’, as you claim, for me to calculate vaccine effectiveness from population data and report on it.
I appreciate that you are happy with the information you have included on vaccine effectiveness. However, the important point is it is not valid to claim that an article using more up-to-date data on real-world infection rates among vaccinated and unvaccinated groups is ‘incorrect’ by citing out-of-date estimates from studies using data from earlier periods, even if they come from government sources. You can point out that the new estimates disagree with the old estimates, but that doesn’t invalidate the new estimates or make them ‘incorrect’. What you are doing amounts to attempted censorship of reporting on emerging data, rather than ‘fact-checking’.
You say you disagree that you have misunderstood the PHE report. But you clearly imply that the PHE report does not show infection rates higher in the vaccinated than the unvaccinated. To quote:
This data had already caused widespread confusion, because it seemed to show for the month in question (August 9th to September 5th) that people in their 40s, 50s, 60s and 70s were more likely to test positive for Covid if they had been vaccinated than if they hadn’t. In particular, a chart displaying the data seemed to give this impression.
This is a patently misleading section as you completely fail to acknowledge that the report plainly does show infection rates higher in the vaccinated in these age groups and instead attempt to make it sound like it does not and that this was a matter of ‘confusion’ on the part of others. The PHE report even explicitly states: “In individuals aged 40 to 79, the rate of a positive COVID-19 test is higher in vaccinated individuals compared to unvaccinated.”
I urge you again, as a matter of professional integrity and for the sake of the credibility of your site, to amend the ‘fact check’ so that it is not misleading in this way and makes clear that the PHE report is correctly understood as showing infection rates higher in the vaccinated in these age groups during this time period.
Kind regards
Will
Will Jones
Associate Editor – Daily Sceptic
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“ so unfortunately the dog has teeth and can’t just be ignored as one more absurd website with excessive faith in its own infallibility”
Well, far from “one more absurd website” it’s the sad truth that the bodies now actively involved in suppressing truth and freedom of speech are now everywhere and virtually all-powerful. Governments, “health” authorities, courts, Big Tech – in the area of covid but also more generally.
TrustPilot also seems to be a site that cannot be trusted.
They have blocked reviews about FullFact:
https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/fullfact.org
“Full Fact Thanks for visiting Trustpilot. Unfortunately, we’ve had to temporarily close this page for new reviews. Feel free to contact us if you have any questions.”
Bloody brilliant Will, my virtual cap is duly doffed!
I rather hope Full Fact don’t do as you request and amend their criticism of your article, as that’s black and white evidence for all to see that contrary to their stated claim of ‘fighting bad information’ – in some instances they are the source of it.
I think we also established that FullFact is housed at the same exclusive address as the Cabinet Office and the Institute of Government. I fancy in an earlier search I also managed to connect them with the World Economic Forum.
Indeed, 2 Carlton Gardens, St. James’s, London SW1Y 5AA. Sandwiched between Pall Mall and the Mall. It’s the office of the Privy Council and the Institute of Government, a whole host of other organisations are in adjoining buildings. Run by ex-Guardian hack Leo Benedictus, brother of Jolyon Maugham.
Sorry, Privy Council not Cabinet Office.
Luminate, the largest funder of FullFact in 2020, is part of the Omidyar Network which is in turn affiliated to the WEF
https://fullfact.org/about/funding/
https://luminategroup.com/about
https://www.weforum.org/organizations/omidyar-network
so it’s more Globalist Narrative than Full fact.
Have you had this fact checked?!
It may not be true but it is what they say.
Good man Will!!
It is outrageous that a legal regulator like Ofcom should be allowed to use an organisation that is funded privately (particularly by those involved in this case) to provide details of what is in their view “inaccurate” and presumably then, perhaps act upon it.
“Bethan” has failed at each point to accept what has clearly been quoted from the PHE report in the article, and the fact that the article includes caveats about that data.
I cannot see how she could claim the headline was inaccurate or misleading.
What arrogance.
What’s more outrageous, and damaging, is that a legal regulator like Ofcom should be concerned at all with “accuracy”. As we’ve seen, the concept is far too open to abuse. They should look at slander and anything obviously criminal (e.g. open, specific, incitement to violence) and nothing else.
Who appointed them the infallible arbiters of facts or the truth? I love it that Will turned the tables and asked them to fact check or retract their own fact check.
“as a matter of professional integrity and for the sake of the credibility of your site”
LOL! Deadpan absurdity. Good stuff.
Excellent work Will.
A point perhaps worth raising is that measuring ‘vaccine effectiveness’ in this way without adjusting for confounders is valid from a point of view of civil liberties. The main confounder is presumably prior infection which may skew the results favourably for the unvaccinated, but if so this is further evidence that restrictions against the unvaccinated would be irrational.
In other words, the government doesn’t adjust for circumstances in the restrictions on travel (and god forbid vax passports) so it’s valid to compare groups that align to government policy.
FullyFucked. Sorry, could not resist.
Full respect to Will for attempting to take on this faceless, soulless opinion manipulating corporate propaganda machine. How did we get here? The enemy has constructed a fully formed digital totalitarian system right under our noses. The Third World War it seems is an information war; and we’re losing
We need to stop fighting it on their terms – they have a virtual monopoly of IT News, so it’s time to use alternative sources – posters, leaflets and the occasional independent newspaper. We could do with a unifying slogan to push this alternate media message.
I’ve been thinking on the same lines – wondering whether all of the millions of people around the world who stand in opposition to this coup should have a single unifying identity. What would it be? I want to design the logo!
I’ve been thinking about it – something such as Natural is Best! Emphasising the truth that natural immunity is superior to the vaccines. Linking something like this phrase to environmental concerns will be very effective. Just need a punchier slogan!
It needs to be a slogan that is difficult to argue with on an emotional level – in much the same way that Black Lives Matter is a very clever slogan (for a Marxist organisation). To argue against it, immediately opens up individuals to allegations of racism!
Like it. What about Still Human?
Aside from the connotations of no genetic manipulation, also speaks to the natural opposition to inhuman measures such as ‘social distancing’, facelessness and digital communication. It’s inclusive…
Yes – the only possible issue with that (and with Natural is Best) is that it will likely upset those who have already been jabbed and they will immediately refuse to even consider the information linked to it.
Maybe a political slogan will be better, after all? Something like ‘People for Freedom!’.
That can encompass demanding freedom of information to do with the jabs (and the financial vested interests, as well as the health risks), along with freedom of choice and freedom to get back to normal.
Like BLM, it’s difficult for a person to argue against, without the easy retort: ‘So, you are against people having freedom!’
I’ve been involved in exposing this creeping advance on our rights by the public health sector for over 30 years (remember the Camelford Poisoning?) and Covid brought it to a head. The public health sector is at war with medicine, and unless we stop it now all forms of medical treatment will be subject to public health ‘approval’ – for which read political policy. But it’s not just in this specific field that this attack is accelerating – ALL branches of science are under siege. So, if you want a slogan to bring a lot of people together, try ‘SAVE OUR SCIENCE!’ After all, SOS is the internationally recognized appeal for immediate help- and that’s exactly what we need, right now.
The “groupthink” in news organizations (and “fact check” organizations) is complete. As far as I can tell, there is no editor or journalist at mainstream news organizations who even entertains alternative interpretations or conclusions. That is, there is no “diversity of thought” in these organizations (or 99 percent of them).
Because of this, stories that should get investigated don’t get investigated. Either no one in the news organization considers doing a story on A, B or C (that would contradict the narrative) or they know that such stories could be written and investigated, but if they were published it would damage their agenda … so they don’t get written for that reason.
Both give us the same result: Only one side of every issue is presented. This is neither the “scientific method” nor “fair and balanced” journalism.
The only way to counter this is for entrepreneurs who think differently to launch sites like this one. One has to go around the “gatekeepers of the news” by starting their own site. And they don’t like that either.
It’s clear from Will’s dispatches that these groups are well aware of the potential influence of The Daily Skeptic and they are working to neuter this influence.
Well – the bright side : it illustrates the biased fraud that this organization is.
Well fought, Will.
The rates of vaccine effectiveness are in some senses secondary to the actual numbers of Covid cases, hospitalisations and deaths post-vaccination, as they are too easily affected (or barely affected at all) by modest changes to the numerators/denominators.
So, just on the absolute numbers (Covid surveillance report week 40):
– over quarter of a million Covid cases amongst the double-jabbed
– nearly 4,000 Covid hospitalisations of double-jabbed people
– 2,750 Covid deaths of double-jabbed people
Even assuming the second two of these are subsets of the first, it’s hardly a ringing endorsement of the jab. On the other hand, as dying within 28 days of a positive Covid test is not the same as dying of Covid, maybe all the numbers are completely unreliable and any statistician worth their professional salt should disown them, even if they do (sort of) support the terror and coercion narrative.
What I expect will happen is that the BBC will run a scare story saying that the jab has failed to prevent 250,000 fully injected people from catching Covid…
I got fact checked for linking directly to a Telegraph article on FB – The counter article cited to discredit my post looked like some obscure journal web article that included spelling mistakes in the headline! Last straw for me and that pit of a site.
If they are so keen on openness, integrity and transparency, it would be fascinating to challenge them on their data (which, surely must be available :-)) on the articles that they have challenged. e.g.
etc… one could compile a pretty extensive list
I am hoping the Telegraph or the Mail, who are the only mainstream media challenging the narrative, might pick up on this blatant corruption of OFCOM as an independent, objective regulator. It is fucking outrageous.
Fact checking only became a thing when the real facts became heresy.
They are not trying to prevent or stop “misinformation.” They are trying to ensure the only information the public receives is false or dubious. They are the real creators and protectors of misinformation.
… or rather, became uncomfortable.
My experience with the fact checkers is that they usually only pick out the most ridiculous, trivial to debunk claims – so as to siphon out their sponsors’ money with the least effort and minimal risk of getting involved in any serious debate. They usually stay clear of anything which is arguable or controversial, and obviously never check anything which counts as mainstream agenda.
Our rookie “fact-checker” Bethan Davies (her only experience: 8 years of journalism for leftist employers) obviously has made a mistake of not following the low hanging fruit rules, and will subsequently be demoted to checking more pressing matters such as vaccine microchips, magnetic properties of vaccinated individuals, flying saucers, or what some top politician had or had not for dinner.
This plague of factcheckers almost always has the odious warmonger Soros or one of his poodle organizations at the bottom of them.
The BBC are just as bad as the so-called fact checkers.
I commented on a BBC article recently about Covid and the moderators deleted it and when I appealed the BBC Central Community Team said the deletion was justified.
How can my factually correct comment be classed as likely to disrupt, provoke, attack or offend others. Is racist, sexist, homophobic, sexually explicit, abusive or otherwise objectionable. Contains swear words or other language likely to offend
“Coming up to 66 and I have researched the benefits and risks of the experimental jab and as I have long lasting natural immunity from previous infection in March 2020 I won’t be letting the jab anywhere near me. I can’t pass it on to anyone else but the vaccinated can pass it on to other people.”
They deleted the post in the last paragraph? Amazing.
I also had a similar experience when I was banned from posting at The Athletic’s Comment Section. All I had done was defend athletes who had refused to get vaccinated.
I used no divisive words or violated no “code of conduct” policy published at the site. I emailed the site’s administrators FIVE times asking why I was banned. I’ve still received no reply and am still unable to make a post.
This censorship trend is accelerating on a daily basis. It is also clear that “our side” is vastly outnumbered by the censors in the “free press.”
“Amazing” Not to those of us with some experience of the BBC. They are a deeply political organisation, dedicated to campaigning with every means at their disposal for the world they want to see.
Yep. It’s actually not “amazing.” It’s predictable, what is now expected. This development is what’s amazing (at least to some of us). Legitimate and important posts are routinely deleted by some anonymous censor.
I had the same experience, by the sounds of it in relation to the same article. I didn’t even use the word ‘experimental’! I simply stated my age, sex, state of health – all incontrovertibly linked to Covid risk – and knowledge and understanding of science and concluded that therefore nothing would currently persuade me that vaccination was appropriate for me. When I appealed the deletion, the response came within 10 minutes saying that the moderator was correct and that they wouldn’t enter into further correspondence. Clear censorship.
Yes. Proof positive of bias when nothing you have said is other than a valid analysis.
The process is not new, however, anyone who was awake noticed the dishonest use of ‘antisemitism’ as a parallel charge to ‘misinformation’ as a weapon against those criticizing Israel during the campaign against Corbyn. The Guardian had a policy of censoring anyone pointing up the horrendous nature of the Palestinian experience under occupation.
Both campaigns use dishonest inversion of an accusation as a weapon, with the aim of achieving the opposite of what is pretended. It is a clear marker of propaganda.
Thus – re. Covid, the ‘misinformation’ charge persecutes the truth seekers, whilst the ‘antisemitism’ charge has been similarly used as a mechanism for attacking Jews who don’t conform to the Starmer establishment line in the Labour Party – to the extent that non-conformist Jewish organisations are now producing numerical evidence of real anti-semitism in terms of the inherent bias used by the current administration of the Labour Party.
Thinking more broadly, the use of ‘following the Science’ is a similar meme, where the black magic claims of ‘The Narrative’ are labelled as the opposite.
… etc, etc.
There perhaps needs to be a new term to describe this process of truth reversal.
If there are confounders that affect the displayed results and somehow invalidate one particular set, then this surely casts a large shadow over any interpretation of the figures, for what FF appear to be saying is the PHE data is not worth bothering with because you cannot rely on it unless you want to say vaccines are good.
Thank you for battling the alleged “fact checkers.” They are the ones often spreading misinformation. Your arguments and rebuttals are far more persuasive.
Let the readers decide whose facts are more believable or whose arguments are more persuasive. The “fact” that they are trying to intimidate and censor those who present alternative narratives is what’s so scary. Another “fact” is that they are succeeding on many levels.
One obvious take-away: They want a world where there is no intelligent dissent. What should we make of this obvious fact?
Another obvious conclusion is that if those pushing the Covidian narrative really believed that that they had strong evidence to back up their claims they wouldn’t be so determined to stifle all opposing viewpoints.
I’ve been labeled an “idiot” for many of my contrarian posts and articles. In my state, I routinely send emails to journalists and editors at our state’s largest news organizations questioning aspects of their COVID stories. I also suggest doing stories on A, B, C and D. One of these journalists has a routine podcast on COVID issues and interviews various “experts.” He always solicits input and ideas for future podcasts. I’ve emailed him, asking if I could debate him for an hour or two. He can pick the topics we discuss. My argument is that I could present storylines that are not being presented at his site. His readers/viewers would appreciate the balance (and many no doubt would agree with me).
I’ve also made the same point you make above. If all of my arguments are “idiotic,” it should be quite easy to embarrass me in any such debate and show how ridiculous my points are. But my offer has never been accepted. My takeaway: They are afraid to debate.
And any dissenter has to fit their stereotype. There was a Radio 4 programme a few weeks back on which one person explained why he wasn’t vaccinated. He was measured and sensible so I’m amazed he was allowed on at all. On the other hand, he was clearly young and black. Presumably so that all their apparently-woke but actually closet-racist-snob viewers could disapprove. I wondered how likely it would have been that they would have allowed me on there. Very unlikely I’d have thought, being a posh white woman. Wouldnt want the listeners thinking that people like them might hold a different view.
Reminds me of ‘John from Manchester’ who had to lie to Jeremy Vine’s researchers to get on his programme. Mr Vine was non too pleased at being blind-sided !
Bethan is well out of her depth there.
She’d be out of her depth standing in a puddle.
Here’s one for those corrupt fact checkers to chew on…
https://rumble.com/vnbv86-winning-the-war-against-therapeutic-nihilism-and-trusted-treatments-vs-unte.html
The flak is always heaviest over the target.
Nice one. Your article is not up to date though anymore. It should say the over 30s!
I’m afraid it’s too complicated for me to get my ageing head around but well done Will for the great work you’re doing.
In any sane, rational world, this would be considered a devastating and brutal takedown (by Jones). But in contemporary/lunatic Britain, these cretinous Fact Haters and their fundamentalist brethren are utterly undone by cognitive dissonance.
Even though they know they’ve been refuted, they have enough faith (which is, ultimately, utterly empty) to believe they’re correct.
It is an art. The art of self-deception.
The real problem here is the behaviour of Ofcom. Fulls***t facts has been correctly identified as a lobby group for the multi-media giants not a charity. So why is the Government allowing a taxpayer funded body break its own charter of impartiality by listening to this left leaning group in the first place?
I enjoyed reading that. Will Jones …. I think I love you
Great work Will. These people are so up themselves, revelling in their sanctimonious behaviour and attempts to control people’s views and thoughts.
have you spotted the evidence table in the vaccine reports? I spotted it a few weeks ago and when you look at it, it show the initial claimed high % of effectiveness and benefits. It now colour coded them supported by evidence and basically, for most of the claims, which are still there as numbers, there is NO evidence according to public health England.
They are not a fact checker but a govt stooge, attempting to clamp down on anything that disagrees with the narrative, even when it’s so clearly in the data. This is the new world, that these folk define ‘fact’ as what they believe, not what is true.
Well done Will.
Sock to ’em, Will!
When I discovered who funded Full Fact over 12 months ago, I resolved never to waste my time reading any more of their propaganda. Turns out it was a good decision.
Good one, Will.
Fact checkers setting themselves up as little tin pot censors. Massive case of hubris.
I suppose there are no proper jobs available to them.
Well done, Will. You wiped the floor with them! The brevity of their final response is another good indicator of their tacit acceptance of defeat.
What a great article. I hope Will has this framed and hung up on his living room wall when he retires. There is a sense of triumph in good over evil. There is a feeling of exposure that the public are being misled. My first ever article for Lockdownsceptics.org was all about my outrage at how the public were being misled about so many things. My last was to expose the cheating involved.
With articles such as this, (and today’s Daily Sceptics newsletter would provide a good example), the Government and mainstream media and certain other public authorities should be quaking in their boots for the day of reckoning. It will come. All the evidence to hold those accountable for the misinformation and deception inflicted on the public is all here.