Anti-vaccine groups are exploiting the suffering and death of people who happen to fall ill after receiving a covid shot, threatening to undermine the largest vaccination campaign in U.S. history.
“This is exactly what anti-vaccine groups do,” said Dr. Peter Hotez, an infectious diseases specialist and author of “Preventing the Next Pandemic: Vaccine Diplomacy in a Time of Anti-Science. “
As more seniors receive their first covid shots, many will inevitably suffer from unrelated heart attacks, strokes and other serious medical problems — not because of the vaccine but, rather, their age and declining health, said epidemiologist Michael Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy.
He cast doubt on statements by medical authorities in Denmark who said the deaths of two people there after vaccination were due to old age and chronic lung disease.
In an interview, Kennedy said the post-vaccination deaths of some very frail and terminally ill nursing home patients in Norway are a danger sign.
Norwegian officials have said the elderly patients died of their underlying illnesses, not from the vaccine.
A spokesperson for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the agency is investigating Michael’s death, as it does for all suspected vaccine-related health problems.
Seven experts in blood disorders interviewed by KHN said there’s not enough information available to blame Michael’s decline on a vaccine and that the demonstrated benefits of covid vaccinations vastly outweigh any potential risk of bleeding.
It takes the body 10 to 14 days after vaccination to generate antibodies, which would be needed to cause immune thrombocytopenia, said Dr. Cindy Neunert, a pediatric hematologist at the Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York City.
Many patients with immune thrombocytopenia are now wondering if they should be vaccinated against covid, Cuker said.
Even in patients with underlying bleeding conditions, “it’s still safer to get vaccinated than to get covid,” Zehnder said.
In an interview with KHN, Kennedy said he questions why government officials have been so quick to dismiss connections between vaccinations and deaths.
Distorting facts to discourage vaccination, Cuker said, is “very irresponsible and damaging to public health. “
