Recently, Danish health authorities decided to stop making Covid vaccines and boosters available to the general population under the age of 50. Note, the general population, not absolutely everyone under 50.
This interesting development, and the fact that the rationale for this decision has not been properly explained, has clearly wrought havoc among those whose day job it is to protect the reputation of these medications.
Flora Teoh, the Science Editor of the “fact checking” website Health Feedback, has now written an article which supposedly refutes the standard summary of this decision, i.e., the Danish health authorities have banned vaccines and boosters for nearly everyone under 50. Teoh‘s article is a typical fact-checking piece. She starts by stating a claim – “Denmark banned COVID-19 vaccines for anyone under 50” – which she then proceeds to refute, but the problem is no one has made that claim.
Two sources are listed, although the “facts” being “checked” are both supposedly contained in a headline above a video and a tweet linking back to an article, not in the YouTube video and article themselves.
The first headline, which refers to a video by Clay Travis, reads: “Denmark Bans Covid Shot For People Under 50 Years Old.“ The second, which is a tweet posted on Toby Young’s account linking to a piece by me in the Daily Sceptic, reads: “Denmark has banned the use of COVID-19 vaccines for people under 50 saying the benefits are too low. What it conspicuously fails to mention (though surely knows it) is that the risks are also too high.”
Unfortunately, neither the headline or the tweet state what Teoh claims they state, namely, that Denmark has banned the covid shots for anyone under 50. The word “anyone“ is crucial here. Instead, all that’s being claimed is that the vaccines have been banned in general for people under 50 and the discussion that follows in both cases contains details on which under-50s are exempt from this ban.
And those are, in effect, headlines. Headlines routinely generalise and exaggerate the contents of the videos and articles they’re flagging up. Let‘s take some examples:
“Food crisis if we ditch Russian oil,” The Times claimed on September 19th, 2022, while the article itself details that this is in fact the opinion of one central banking institute. In other words, it is not a fact that ditching Russian oil means food crisis, it is the opinion of some.
“High-profile Dems silent when asked about housing migrants,“ Fox News said in a headline the same day. But if you read the main text it turns out this does not at apply to all high-profile Democrats, only a handful. If Fox had said “All high-profile Dems silent…” its headline would be wrong. But it doesn‘t, thus it isn’t wrong. By the same token, while Denmark’s ban on Covid shots for people under 50 applies to almost everyone, there are a few exceptions. Headlines are headlines. Branding a video description or a tweet as “misinformation” because they contain condensed and generalised information, with a more detailed discussion in what follows, has nothing to do with checking facts. It’s just about creating strawmen, especially when the “fact-checker” even distorts the quoted headline to make it fit her narrative. This is what Flora Teoh does in her article by adding the crucial word “anyone“.
Teoh then moves on, claiming the Danish ban on vaccinations only applies to boosters. This is incorrect. The first section of the Q&A on the official website explains to whom COVID-19 vaccines should be made available in general, not just boosters:
Question: Who will be offered vaccination against COVID-19?
Answer: People aged 50 years and over will be offered vaccination. People aged under 50 who are at a higher risk of becoming severely ill from COVID-19 will also be offered vaccination against COVID-19.
Staff in the healthcare and elderly care sector as well as in selected parts of the social services sector who have close contact with patients or citizens who are at higher risk of becoming severely ill from COVID-19 will also be offered booster vaccination against COVID-19.
In addition, we recommend that relatives of persons at particularly higher risk accept the offer of vaccination to protect their relatives who are at particularly higher risk.
Before the start of the vaccination programme, the Danish Health Authority will publish guidelines for which persons aged under 50 are recommended booster vaccination.
This is the full list of the groups to whom the vaccination will be available. People under 50 who neither work in the service sectors mentioned, nor are at high risk of severe illness from COVID-19, are NOT eligible for vaccination. Vaccinating them is banned.
Then on to the boosters:
Question: Why are people under 50 not to be re-vaccinated?
Answer: The purpose of the vaccination programme is to prevent severe illness, hospitalisation and death. Therefore, people at the highest risk of becoming severely ill will be offered booster vaccination. The purpose of vaccination is not to prevent infection with COVID-19, and people aged under 50 are therefore currently not being offered booster vaccination.
People aged under 50 are generally not at particularly higher risk of becoming severely ill from COVID-19. In addition, younger people aged under 50 are well protected against becoming severely ill from COVID-19, as a very large number of them have already been vaccinated and have previously been infected with COVID-19, and there is consequently good immunity among this part of the population.
It is important that the population also remembers the guidance on how to prevent the spread of infection, including staying at home in case of illness, frequent aeration or ventilation, social distancing, good coughing etiquette, hand hygiene and cleaning.
Notice the words in the first question: “not to be re-vaccinated“. This is a pretty definitive prohibition.
Flora Teoh then moves on with a number of claims which appear to be unsubstantiated or false:
She explicitly claims, referring to general vaccination, not boosters, that people “can still choose to get the vaccine if they wish”. While this may have been the message last April, it is clear from the Q&A quoted above that for the general population under 50 this is no longer the case.
She claims the “benefits” of the COVID-19 vaccine “outweigh their risks”, without providing any reference to support this statement, let alone acknowledge how research and real-life data already show how the risks in fact outweigh the benefits for younger age-groups, especially young males.
Discussing the reason the vaccination programme was halted last spring, Teoh says: “It was this level of high vaccine coverage, coupled with falling numbers of COVID-19 cases that enabled Denmark to stop broad vaccination efforts,” quoting a CNBC story. The CNBC story, however explains that the immunity rested on not only vaccination, but also on natural immunity. Teoh fails to mention this crucial fact.
Claiming the COVID-19 vaccines are dangerous is a “false narrative” Teoh says. This is wrong. As studies have already shown, there are multiple risks associated with those vaccines, and for many groups the risk of vaccination is higher than the risk of the disease. Thus, they are dangerous for people in those groups.
Flora Teoh‘s article has nothing to do with checking facts or correcting wrong statements. All it has to do with is creating and then attacking strawmen, by distorting headlines, ignoring the crucial difference between headlines and the text they refer to, and presenting a number of unsubstantiated or false statements. Her “key takeaway” does not even address the issue in question – it is simply pure propaganda for the vaccines:
KEY TAKEAWAY: COVID-19 vaccines are highly effective at reducing a person’s risk of developing severe COVID-19 and death. More than 80% of Denmark’s population were fully vaccinated against COVID-19 by April 2022. Booster doses are now being offered to groups with a high risk of developing severe COVID-19. This will enhance protection against severe disease and death in the most vulnerable, as a large wave of infections are expected in the autumn and winter.
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The backbench MPs who threatened to oust Kim Jong-Johnson can be credited for there not being a lockdown.
Kim Jong-Johnson was positively itching to impose lockdown.
If you read only one essay today, let it be this one by Jeffrey Tucker of the Brownstone Institute. There aren’t many adults left in the room … but Tucker is one of them.
This explains how we got to where we are, but, more importantly, asks how do we get out of this mess. We are in uncharted territory when the unelected bureaucrats and crony oligarchs really pull all the strings.
https://brownstone.org/articles/now-is-the-time-for-mass-resignations-from-within-the-ruling-class/?fbclid=IwAR3jZfgY07Qgj_2eggq-fG4GZG9q2rfsyyi6nKQTpI9lGYM2KYcREUh3-V8
It had not previously dawned on me that both Arden an Trudeau are snivelling away from their own people at the same time using the same excuses.
The author does not explain why the coming impasse between the lockdown technocracy and the rest will lead to their mass resignations except for some vague idea that it would be doing the right thing, as if.
Truckers are not typical of ‘the people’ if only because they need to be strong and tough, unfashionable though that is supposed to be these days. They each own a valuable business, make lifetime altering decisions every day, multi tasking constantly and thoughroughly admirable.
They might be truly independent in ways most of us can hardly dream about but not typical. It would be nice to think of them as an anti technocracy vanguard but I’m not holding my breath for the rest of us to follow.
What is of more interest in this essay is that the New Elite, as some of them brazenly describe themselves, have exposed themselves and their methods for such paltry gains. Flogged some PPI, cozied up to China (to what end? China doesn’t need them), given themselves some sparkly media exposure by a media basking in its perceived self importance and, in the UK, recieved a few gongs from Her Maj.
With the acknowledged fundamental transfer of power from where we thought it was, the ballot box, to where it really is, as illustrated so brilliantly in the world of Yes Minister/Prime Minister several decades ago they turn out to be a bunch of low achievers who haven’t even gathered much in the way of heritable futunes or power.
https://youtu.be/zG7XZ2JXZqY
If you haven’t seen it, and have an hour to spare I’d highly recommend this video with Dr Jay Bhattacharya (of Great Barrington Declaration fame) by Peter Robinson for the Hoover Institute.
One of the highlights for me is that they confirm that focussed protection for the elderly could have seen us provide food delivery, alternative accommodation and nursing care to vulnerable groups for a tiny fraction of the costs associated with lockdowns of the healthy not at risk population. First class care to those in need.
Children would have remained in education, businesses would have thrived, and the national debt would have not become cripplingly bad for our future prosperity. “Omnicron” would have happened many months ago, and the only shortage would be of the Greek alphabet letters to name the newest, and weakest strains.
Governments around the world have magnified the harms caused that the actual threat we faced bears no relationship whatsoever to the harms we now see everywhere. It’s like a bar brawl escalated into an all out war.
PS haven’t listened to the podcast – I’ve heard that podcasts are really dangerous vessels of information – Prince and Princess GingerNutMeg of California said so.
‘Freedom Convoy’ eyewitness on Canada’s SHOCKING anti-protest tactics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvM_865Ju0A
Ezra Levant, Founder of Rebel News, witnessed firsthand the immense support ‘Freedom Convoy’ truckers received from Canadians throughout the nation and specifically in Ottawa. But the anti-protest tactics used by both Canadian police forces and government officials (like Castro super-fan President Justin Trudeau) are just like the tactics used in Venezuela today, Levant says. Truckers with all kinds of backgrounds are tired of their overbearing government mandating rules that just don’t make sense. Levant explains how their stand against that government has formed a new coalition of Canadians — onetime Trudeau voters included — who are tired of the ‘bully state.’ GLEN BECK
We need far more people at all our events here
if we want the tyranny to end for good
Tuesday 1st February 2pm to 3pm
Yellow Boards By the Road
Between Henley Bridge & Little Angel Pub
White Hill A4130
Henley-on-Thames RG9 2LY
Stand in the Park Sundays 10am make friends, ignore the madness & keep sane
Wokingham Howard Palmer Gardens Cockpit Path car park Sturges Rd RG40 2HD
Henley Mills Meadows (at the bandstand) Henley-on-Thames RG9 1DS
Telegram Group
http://t.me/astandintheparkbracknell
Delingpole is such a tube. I feel sorry for Toby having to co-host with him. Toby, I suggest you find another podcast you can contribute to without having to do constant battle with a fringe nutcase.
I hope Toby and James were practicing for the shooting at dawn of the main criminals involved in the scamdemic!