Before this programme was screened on July 20th 2022, promotional material from the BBC and in newspaper articles such as this suggested it was going to be extremely biased and inaccurate.
Based on this publicity material we already wrote articles first criticising the claim that only 8% of the U.K. adult population was unvaccinated and then highlighting the fact that the publicity material failed to reveal the blatant conflicts of interest of the key ‘experts’ used in the programme to convince the seven unvaccinated participants to get vaccinated.
Our pre-screening articles and tweets about the forthcoming programme were very widely read and one of the participants, Nazarin, contacted us to express her serious concerns about the way the programme was made – and how it might be edited – and to confirm that the participants were indeed not informed of the experts’ conflicts of interest (this is covered well in this article by threadsirish). Her subsequent tweets, such as the following, made clear her extreme concerns about the programme even before it was screened.
The programme turned out to be every bit as bad and biased as feared.
Many of the problems have been highlighted by the especially vocal participants Nazarin and Vicky (see their interviews with Dan Wooton and Sonia Poulton). Below we summarise our key concerns and what was missing.
- Claim of 4 million U.K. adults unvaccinated: Despite us alerting the BBC to this error (which led it to change its website description) this claim (i.e., that only 8% of adults were unvaccinated) was right up front. It set the context suggesting that this was only a tiny crazed minority. But what was really interesting is that the presenter Hannah Fry stated that, as part of the programme research, they did a survey of 2,500 people about their views on vaccination and she was surprised to discover that 600 were unvaccinated. If the sample was representative of U.K. adults (and there was no suggestion it was not) then that means 24% of U.K. adults are unvaccinated, which is even higher than the figure we estimate, and blows apart the BBC’s ludicrous 8% claim. (UPDATE: @NakedEmperorUK points out that the survey was indeed representative of the population and that the actual number never vaccinated was 664 out of 2,570 – i.e., 26%. This provides further evidence of what we have claimed for a long time: the ONS is massively underestimating the proportion of unvaccinated.)
- Failure to disclose the Pfizer links of the two key experts (Finn and Khalil) on the programme: As feared, the programme did not inform either the participants or the viewers of the major conflicts of interest of the key experts. Professor Adam Finn (Bristol University) was the expert chosen to explain what the vaccines were and why they were safe; but he is the leader of the Pfizer Centre of Excellence for Epidemiology of Vaccine-preventable Diseases – set up with an initial £4.6 million investment in May 2021. He even implied he was independent when he said, about the U.S. pharma companies Pfizer and Moderna, that he “acted as a buffer between them and the public”. Asma Khalil was the expert chosen to explain why it was important for pregnant women to get the vaccination. But Asma Khalil is the Principal Investigator of the Pfizer Covid vaccination in pregnancy trial. Another expert, psychologist Clarissa Simas has had many Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) grants.
- Failure to disclose background to FullFact.org: The CEO Will Moy was brought in to claim that vaccine hesitancy was all due to online ‘misinformation’. But Full Fact has received massive funding by organisations like Google and Facebook to present precisely the biased narrative that all the Covid ‘misinformation’ is coming from ‘antivaxxers and conspiracy theorists’ and it has shown no interest in pointing out the far greater volume of misinformation put out by governments, the pharmaceutical companies and their supporters. They only ‘fact check’ information that counters the ‘standard narrative’ and avoid checking obvious misinformation claims of vaccine efficacy and safety. For some background on how bad Full Fact are see this article.
- No challenge to the many explicit false claims made: Among the most outrageous and demonstrably false claims that went unchallenged were: 1) Adam Finn claimed that people had stronger immunity from the vaccination than from having been infected; 2) Asma Khalil claimed the vaccination was not only completely safe for pregnant women but actually reduced the risk of miscarriage by 15% (but look at what was in the Pfizer trial with more here).
- The jellybeans game: Hannah Fry tried to create the impression that only one in 33,000 had a serious adverse reaction by mischievously picking that number as the incidence of myocarditis, which she claims was the most common serious adverse reaction. Showing what 33,000 jellybeans looked like – only one of which was ‘bad’ – was supposed to show how ‘rare’ adverse reactions to the vaccines were. But the most recent relevant data (from the German Government) actually suggest as many as one in 300 serious adverse reactions per dose after the vaccine. Assuming independence between doses this means that a triple vaccinated person has an approximate probability of one in a 100 of getting a serious adverse reaction and for a person doubled boosted this rises to one in 75. And, as somebody on Twitter said: “What if all the bad jelly beans were in one big batch and all the others weren’t ‘good jelly beans’ – we just didn’t know yet?”
- No mention of the failure of the vaccination to stop infection or transmission of Covid.
- Failure to humanise any actual vaccination victims. The programme spoke about actual unvaccinated people dying from Covid, but used the bad jelly beans to represent vaccination victims. Why didn’t they mention actual victims like the BBC’s own Lisa Shaw or Vicky Spit’s husband Zion?
- The ludicrous and misleading MMR vaccination anecdote: In response to the nine-page Pfizer report of adverse reactions, Hannah Fry used a bizarre anecdote to downplay its impact. This imagined a doctor about to give the MMR jab to a child when the phone rings; there is a 50:50 chance he picks up the phone before giving the jab. He picks up the phone and during the call the child has a fit. Saying there was a 50:50 chance the doctor picks up the phone or gives the jab deliberately creates the false impression that there is also a 50:50 chance any adverse reaction after a vaccination is purely coincidental.
- No challenge to the powerful claim that 20 out of 21 ICU patients at St. Georges’s hospital in Dec 2021 were unvaccinated: All evidence of national ICU data suggests vaccinated are now disproportionally hospitalised with Covid, so this claim was either false/exaggerated or an unbelievable outlier. Much more likely, the ‘unvaccinated’ were defined as ‘not fully boosted’ rather than ‘never vaccinated’ as was implied.
- Failure to mention reported data on adverse reactions: Systems like VAERS in the U.S. and Yellow Card in the U.K. make it difficult to report adverse reactions and so are widely believed to massively underestimate true numbers. Yet, in VAERS alone (mainly U.S.) as of July 8th there were 1,341,605 Covid vaccine adverse reactions, of which 29,460 were deaths. In all 32 years of VAERS reporting a total of only 9,754 deaths (and 878,053 adverse events) were recorded for all other vaccines combined. So, in just 18 months, three times as many deaths for Covid vaccines have been recorded than in 32 years combined for all other vaccines.
- No mention of the true risk of Covid based on world wide data: Except for those with multiple comorbidities (who are not given appropriate early treatments) Covid poses very little risk of hospitalisation and death. Young people are at essentially zero risk of dying due to Covid.
- No mention of the way Covid data are by definition fixed to exaggerate cases numbers, hospitalisations, deaths as well as vaccine efficacy and safety. Specifically: any person admitted to hospital who had a PCR positive within 14 days prior – or who tests PCR positive after hospitalisation – is classified as a Covid hospitalisation even if the reason for hospitalisation was unrelated to Covid; any person who dies within 28 days of a PCR positive test is classified as a Covid death irrespective of the true cause of death; any person who contracts Covid or who suffers adverse reaction inside 14 days of vaccination is classified as ‘unvaccinated’.
- No mention of lack of long-term safety data: In particular, the failure of the Pfizer trial to provide this was glossed over, suggesting that their people were so dedicated that they worked much faster than for any previous vaccine to ensure a high quality and safe product.
- No mention of all the protocol violations now known in the main Pfizer trial. Even with the violations, Pfizer’s own data showed more deaths in the vaccine arm than placebo arm and the risk of serious adverse event in the vaccinated was greater than the risk of Covid hospitalisation in the unvaccinated.
- No mention of international data showing strong evidence the vaccine is neither effective nor safe: Countries with the lowest vaccination rates have the lowest Covid death rates; spikes in all-cause deaths happen after vaccination dose rollouts; countries with the highest vaccination rates have the highest Covid rates and are experiencing non-Covid excess death increases; and falling birth rates. There is no reliable evidence anywhere in world that vaccinated people have lower all-cause mortality than unvaccinated.
- What was Hannah Fry’s involvement in the stat/maths modelling: Near the start of the programme Hannah stated that she had been involved in the stats/maths modelling that “helped get us out of lockdown”. This was a surprising claim. It’s the first we had heard that such modelling was formally used to get us out of lockdown. If she was involved in such modelling, she was presumably also involved in the modelling that took us into lockdown (curiously nobody wants to be associated with that any more given we know it was so wrong with disastrous consequences). What exactly was her involvement in this modelling – are there papers describing it other than this one?
Norman Fenton is Professor in Risk Information Management at Queen Mary University of London. Martin Neil is Professor in Computer Science and Statistics at Queen Mary University of London. This article first appeared on their website, Probability and Risk.
Stop Press: Watch Nick Dixon, host of our podcast the Weekly Sceptic, discuss the “fair and balanced” documentary on the latest episode of the Lotus Eaters podcast.
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Excellent overview of the many biases/partialities and lies in the programme. Thank you! Awful what rubbish passes for informed/educated treatment of subjects now, especially at the BBC.
Very good succinct piece.
Unfortunately I’m losing steam in sending powerful articles like this to my asleep relatives and friends. I know they won’t read them past the title. It probably just irritates them now. I imagine that they dismiss these realities and deep down do not want to face the fact that they fucxed up big time by getting jabbed with this junk.
The BBC is a powerful engine for many things I believe to be very wrong in this country and in the world in general. It seems to me more like a political campaigning organisation than a news and entertainment enterprise. Its bias is fairly well agreed on even by those working within it. It must be privatised/broken up/disbanded. Disbanding would be ideal as the hold it has over the public by virtue of its “official” status will last for generations otherwise.
Yet more disgraceful, irresponsible, treatment of the British public by the BBC. They really must look in the mirror, or ’go woke unkind go broke for ever’!
The BBC is repulsive.
The Government’s/TRPTB’s main propaganda unit need calling out at every opportunity. No surprise to most on here that such a programme would emanate from the BBC sooner or later. What further delights await…..
It seems the ONS is going the same way, see Norman Fenton’s comments on the ever increasing difficulties in being able to trust it.
He and the likes of Clair Craig have got their work cut out.
Does anyone know precisely how and where the ONS get their figures from, are there any independent (lol) checks carried out as to the accuracy of even basic data supplied to the ONS? Can we have the same confidence in the ONS as we have in the BBC.
Just more evidence of why the BBC is now perhaps the biggest threat to the UK. It’s unique position to influence the culture impacts every decision made from Government through to the public. Interesting statistics about how many people haven’t had the shot. I hear rumours that they’re going to come after unvaccinated people in a big way from September onwards, so this is presumably the advance guard.
The biggest problem is that I’ve read widely to make my decisions, but I’m not the sort of person who can recall statistics off the top of his head and I’m rubbish in debates, because I get nervous and go blank when I come up against an aggressive evangelist type, so I’d always look foolish and unknowledgeable on such a programme.
Well said sir and like you I’m hopeless in an argument. Some people are really good at rolling stats off their head unfortunately I’m not one, but like you I’ve read enough to know I’ve made the correct decision.
Can only hope that Fry has taken the jabs herself.
I think most regulars on here could have written this article in some shape or form but of course the wider populace will never see such. The BBC and most other MSM outlets will know this and that the vast majority will readily absorb what was featured on the documentary with no questions asked. The real point of the BBC’s programme was obviously not to convince unvaccinated to change their minds but to portray the subjects as misinformed, swivel-eyed ‘refuseniks’ that are a danger to themselves and everyone else. From what I’ve seen, it worked.
Sadly I think you’re correct re the BBCs intentions but more especially the results achieved. Time they were defunded.
An excellent article that complements one on TCW.
Is someone taking the Beeb to Offcom over this? Not that will mean much since that toothless pussycat is stuffed with Beeb types.
The time for the baseball bats is drawing nigher.
Copy the article text to your MP, requesting he raise questions in the House as to why the BBC are flagrantly breaching their Legal Charter of impartiality, i.e. they are breaking the law?
I used to have a lot of respect for Dr Hannah Fry as she has fronted many documentaries about Electricity / Computing / Mathematics, all of which I have a keen interest in.
However, she’s dead to me now.
Agreed. She has joined the club of presenters who have lost their reputation.
Neil Oliver is the only familiar face I credit.
He’s an exception. Although he did appear on the Beeb for a while, his output on GBN is good. Can’t imagine that the Beeb would broadcast what he often says on GBN.
Looking at the comments in the Daily Mail article linked to in the article, it seems that the vast majority of readers have woken up to the BBC’s antics and were expecting nothing even approximating to the truth from the state propaganda machine. Not surprising that a quarter of a million people (including myself) cancelled their TV licences last year. It suggest to me that, despite the best efforts of big tech at censorship and “fact-checking” and the relentless fear-p0rn of the mass media, an increasing number of people are getting the truth from somewhere.
“an increasing number of people are getting the truth from somewhere.”
God I hope so – please!
The way I see it, this is just recorded evidence that can be used at future trials for participation in/being an accessory to crimes against humanity.
It is beyond shameless to still be pushing this garbage. Recent data from the Dutch RIVM (pulic health authority and research institute) shows quite clearly that 2x vaxxed are, for all intents and purposes, now unvaxxed – the lines virtually converge on all markers of ‘effectiveness’. At the same time, 3x vaxxed, although initially showing what looks like somewhat greater protection than unvaxxed/2x vaxx, at some 4 months after the 3rd vaxx appeared to show a significant increase in risk of hospitalisation and admission to ICU. The recent numbers indicated some protection afforded by the 4th vaxx, but the charts only went up to the end of June – which will have been the start of the 4 month mark since the first 4th poke was handed out (we know any ‘protection’ takes a dive after 3 months).
So we have no data for the period when we should see not only a drop in protection but what I believe to be a period during which those more recently vaxxed see an increase in risk. What we do have here in NL is excess mortality since the week ending 5 June, primarily in the 65+ group (4th vaxx only given to 60+). In the week ending 10 July it was just on the outer limits of what could be expected (still far higher than the average), the week ending 17 July saw a sharp increase again. We did not have the heatwave the UK and other countries had, we only had a heat alert for Monday 18 and Tuesday 19 July, so that does not explain the excess mortality.
A similar excess mortality is seen for a few weeks from the end of March 2022 – some 4 months after the 3rd vaxx.
Igor Chudov has a good article on spike protein tolerance induced by continuous poking, so that people do not have the immune reaction that causes the worst symptoms – but also do not clear the virus/spike protein, which still causes damage. It does provide an explanation of what is happening and if it’s correct, the drug pushers and their handmaidens need to be hounded to the gates of hell.
I too found the Igor Chudov article an amazing read.
Maybe if there are some hedge fund managers who read DS they might be inclined to heavily short Pfizer stock.
I did see a comment – on this site – a few months back, about an overheard Wall Street Banker saying something like “it’s likely Pfizr will be Bankrupt in a few years due to crimes against humanity”
I talk to a lot of healthcare investors as part of my role. They are mostly still asleep, though starting to wake up.
As with anything in investing, timing is everything. And a short position can go really wrong, if the share price rises. You have to time it to perfection.
Too many scandals to now assert credibility.
I don’t understand why anyone agreed to take part in the programme. Did they expect the BBC to have undergone some kind of conversion?
It’s a good question. Some may have thought it would be a an opportunity to put “our” case, others might simply be unvaxxed but have no real awareness of the extent of the BBC’s evil.
This is a lose – lose scenario. People who participiate will be taken for a ride. Those who don’t obviously don’t dare to — no wonder, given their evil and unclean ways. In both cases, the establishment propagandists get useful material to work with.
The NHS table in TCW suggests about 23% English adults have refused ONE jab. That is similar to the figures in this really good article.
So, about a quarter of us have entirely rejected the propaganda. How heartening when you consider it was the most extreme lie since Goebells and Streicher.
And past revolutions were made on less than a quarter of committed citizens.
This is why the Tories will not reform the BBC. For when push comes to shove, they toe the globalist NWO line on climate change/net zero, pandemic and bigging up the UN, WHO and all the rest.
My blood boils.
It’s at times like these I feel that reading even the wonderful Daily Sceptic is just too much stress for my health and sanity to bear.
No mention that for the vast majority of the healthy population vaccination against the effects of Covid was entirely unnecessary.
It’s barely imaginable that some of these … unvaccinated … even lack the good manners the participiate seriously in their own, planned, public humilation by a team of Corona zealots and Pfizer stoog^W^Wvaccine experts assembled for this very purpose. Thank God that we have beacons of enlightened humanity like Vicki Power to tell us what we ought to think about them!
Technical explanation: ^W denotes the key combination ctrl + w, the traditional werase control character of a UNIX terminal. This deletes the word to the left of it. Hence, the text above is supposed to communicate that someone was about to type Pfizer stooges, realized the inappropriateness of this midway, pressed ^W twice to get rid of it and replaced it with the much more appropriate vaccine experts.
Hannah Fry is a complete hypocrite. Makes programmes and writes articles questioning standard treatment approaches for her own cervical cancer, but when it comes to the Covid vaccines, no questions allowed.
If anybody on this forum still pays for the BBC’s execrable propaganda, may I urge you to save your money and salve your conscience by withdrawing your financial support. Follow the steps provided by the excellent Defund the BBC campaign.
It is a straightforward phone call.
https://www.defundbbc.uk/defund-the-bbc-in-5-steps/
I kind of wish I had gone on this programme, to be the participant from Hell for them. But they’d have edited it their way anyway. And done inane voiceovers that I’d not be privy to. so I’m very glad I didn’t.
Jellybeans eh? Guess what? I did the qcovid.org thing from Oxford university in the first wave of the pandemic, and guess what it said my risk of dying with covid was?
1 in 50,000. What a coincidence!
Isn’t it about time Hannah dyed her hair all the colours of the rainbow? I mean, one colour? C’mon Hannah, not very inclusive is it?
Comply and die.
No one any longer even mentions the BBC’s charter obligation of impartiality. Like expecting a government minister who misleads the House at the despatch box to return and correct what he has said, It has become an indicator of extreme naivety to even think of that BBC obligation anymore. Of course the BBC is biased. it is a campaigning body for right-on whatever. It exists to chuckle and sneer at Britishness, dramatise and exaggerate bad weather, deride vaccine reluctance and promote homosexuality. The BBC is truly disgusting.
And within the last hour, Mark Steyn did a good job in his programme on GBN, essentially taking them to the cleaners, with two guests who had appeared on the BBC show.
Thank you for this excellent article.
On the plus side, the programme is another nail in the coffin of the BBC.
If the BBC wished to shoot itself in the foot and expose itself for the propaganda arm of the elite/globalists/CovidMafia etc that it it is, it surely couldn’t have done a better job than this documentary. It is so full of holes that it’s like a sieve leaking its slippery lies and gooey misinformation creating such an oily mess on the floor that none of its purported truths can stand up. It didn’t just shoot itself in the foot, but, to paraphrase the Italian Job, it blew the bloody foot off! Of course, those that snooze on and lap up the nonsense will feed on this as confirmation of their choices and be none the wiser but for those who actually look further than their online remote for info, it will set the alarm bells ringing. Good job BBC! You’ve reverse engineered your own propaganda!
The BBC do not exist in my mind. I cancelled my unecessary lisence 2 years ago and have never been more content