Anti-vaccine groups embrace pseudoscience “detox” treatments to undo vaccination(nbcnews.com)
nbcnews.com
Anti-vaccine groups embrace pseudoscience “detox” treatments to undo vaccination
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/covid-vaccine-mandates-push-holdouts-get-shot-detox-rcna4859
18 comments
> I’m in an awkward position of figuring out how my young child can spend time with them in a safe manner
I'm assuming this person doesn't actually have covid, they just didn't get the vaccine which makes them slightly less likely to transmit covid if they get it, and much less likely to have a bad case of covid. And I'm assuming your young child doesn't normally need special accommodation and so has an incomprehensibly small chance of having any complications from covid. Yet you look down on this family member as having a "lack of rationality".
I don't mean to say people shouldn't be encouraged to get vaccinated, but healthy, vaccinated people treating unvaccinated people as some kind of plague carrying monsters is at least as irrational as having questions about vaccination.
I'm assuming this person doesn't actually have covid, they just didn't get the vaccine which makes them slightly less likely to transmit covid if they get it, and much less likely to have a bad case of covid. And I'm assuming your young child doesn't normally need special accommodation and so has an incomprehensibly small chance of having any complications from covid. Yet you look down on this family member as having a "lack of rationality".
I don't mean to say people shouldn't be encouraged to get vaccinated, but healthy, vaccinated people treating unvaccinated people as some kind of plague carrying monsters is at least as irrational as having questions about vaccination.
It sounds like he has gone through an iterative process with them: they offer some objection to vaccination, he provides a refutation of that objection, they switch to a different objection, repeat. And it sounds like as this loop repeats they are turning to increasingly bogus conspiracy theories for new objections.
Based on what I've seen from social media that kind of person usually doesn't just reject COVID vaccination. They usually seem to also reject masking, social distancing, avoiding crowds, and often just assume that it must just be a cold when they do get sick and so don't get tested and don't take much care to not expose others.
If he's dealing with that kind of family member, keeping his kid away from them until the pandemic is over is not unreasonable.
Based on what I've seen from social media that kind of person usually doesn't just reject COVID vaccination. They usually seem to also reject masking, social distancing, avoiding crowds, and often just assume that it must just be a cold when they do get sick and so don't get tested and don't take much care to not expose others.
If he's dealing with that kind of family member, keeping his kid away from them until the pandemic is over is not unreasonable.
I'd say there is some rational middle ground, and over reactions on each side.
Personally I'm sympathetic to people who are hesitant about getting a new vaccine. But I'd consider any sort of conspiracy theory to be irrational. (Though I think you miss the point that many people don't agree with someone else telling them what medical treatment to take, but rather than articulate that will cling to less sound arguments and when these are debunked fall back to another, which is I think what you're seeing). But I'm sure there are people who harbor some irrational fear of vaccines or unsupported thoughts about how they work
At the same time, there are also people who have gone crazy with covid fear, and believe no ritual is over the top to protect themselves or to signal to others. People walking alone with nobody around wearing a mask, people taking hand sanitizing to extremes, people who insist we all get vaccinated but also continue to wear masks, people who think their healthy kids should wear masks at school, and as I'm inferring from the post, people who despite an infinitesimal risk still want to have a say in what others do and worry about "safely" visiting or whatever. The original post is just as crazy as people worring about side effects from vaccines, which is my point.
Personally I'm sympathetic to people who are hesitant about getting a new vaccine. But I'd consider any sort of conspiracy theory to be irrational. (Though I think you miss the point that many people don't agree with someone else telling them what medical treatment to take, but rather than articulate that will cling to less sound arguments and when these are debunked fall back to another, which is I think what you're seeing). But I'm sure there are people who harbor some irrational fear of vaccines or unsupported thoughts about how they work
At the same time, there are also people who have gone crazy with covid fear, and believe no ritual is over the top to protect themselves or to signal to others. People walking alone with nobody around wearing a mask, people taking hand sanitizing to extremes, people who insist we all get vaccinated but also continue to wear masks, people who think their healthy kids should wear masks at school, and as I'm inferring from the post, people who despite an infinitesimal risk still want to have a say in what others do and worry about "safely" visiting or whatever. The original post is just as crazy as people worring about side effects from vaccines, which is my point.
Why not accept their decision not to take the vaccine? I think this is a choice - it shouldn't be mandated by the government. These vaccines are at best experimental - I'm not saying they don't work, but I am not confident enough in them to take the shot. After they've been used for a few years, and I see that there are no adverse effects, I'm fine taking it (if needed).
I'm not about the conspiracy theories, but I don't just jump on every bandwagon that comes along. I don't care how many have already taken it. Time will tell if it's safe.
If your counter argument is that they have been tested and doctors and other professionals have stated that there is no way of adverse effects in the future, then why is everyone signing a release before taking the shot, freeing all parties of legal action? Nobody will take responsibility if something happens to you from this shot, but they want to mandate it. Interesting.
I'm not about the conspiracy theories, but I don't just jump on every bandwagon that comes along. I don't care how many have already taken it. Time will tell if it's safe.
If your counter argument is that they have been tested and doctors and other professionals have stated that there is no way of adverse effects in the future, then why is everyone signing a release before taking the shot, freeing all parties of legal action? Nobody will take responsibility if something happens to you from this shot, but they want to mandate it. Interesting.
> These vaccines are at best experimental - I'm not saying they don't work, but I am not confident enough in them to take the shot.
A drug that has been given 7.5 billion times is not experimental.
Crucially, the mRNA vaccines have a very similar effect on the body to previous vaccines. The fundamental mechanism is the same: stimulate an immune response to a particular pathogen without actually giving someone the pathogen.
> If your counter argument is that they have been tested and doctors and other professionals have stated that there is no way of adverse effects in the future, then why is everyone signing a release before taking the shot, freeing all parties of legal action?
I got my vaccine in the US and didn't sign a release to free anyone of legal action.
Also, the way we know that it won't have adverse effects in the future is that the vaccine doesn't persist in your system. If it's going to harm you, the harm will be in the short term. It can't just pop up again in 6 months.
You shouldn't take my word for it. Do your own research[1], as they say.
1. https://medical.mit.edu/covid-19-updates/2021/06/will-kids-h...
A drug that has been given 7.5 billion times is not experimental.
Crucially, the mRNA vaccines have a very similar effect on the body to previous vaccines. The fundamental mechanism is the same: stimulate an immune response to a particular pathogen without actually giving someone the pathogen.
> If your counter argument is that they have been tested and doctors and other professionals have stated that there is no way of adverse effects in the future, then why is everyone signing a release before taking the shot, freeing all parties of legal action?
I got my vaccine in the US and didn't sign a release to free anyone of legal action.
Also, the way we know that it won't have adverse effects in the future is that the vaccine doesn't persist in your system. If it's going to harm you, the harm will be in the short term. It can't just pop up again in 6 months.
You shouldn't take my word for it. Do your own research[1], as they say.
1. https://medical.mit.edu/covid-19-updates/2021/06/will-kids-h...
> Crucially, the mRNA vaccines have a very similar effect on the body to previous vaccines. The fundamental mechanism is the same: stimulate an immune response to a particular pathogen without actually giving someone the pathogen.
If I started a new car company, and it put out it's first mass market vehicle, would you accept me saying "yeah, it's a car, it works like every other car out there, it has 4 wheels and drives down the road", would you assume it has the same reliability and safety record as an equivalent Honda or Toyota?
> Also, the way we know that it won't have adverse effects in the future is that the vaccine doesn't persist in your system. If it's going to harm you, the harm will be in the short term. It can't just pop up again in 6 months.
If someone was diagnosed with cancer (or an autoimmune issue, or dementia, etc) today, when did that diagnosis become inevitable? Yesterday? Last year? How do we know that the harm will manifest itself immediately?
If I started a new car company, and it put out it's first mass market vehicle, would you accept me saying "yeah, it's a car, it works like every other car out there, it has 4 wheels and drives down the road", would you assume it has the same reliability and safety record as an equivalent Honda or Toyota?
> Also, the way we know that it won't have adverse effects in the future is that the vaccine doesn't persist in your system. If it's going to harm you, the harm will be in the short term. It can't just pop up again in 6 months.
If someone was diagnosed with cancer (or an autoimmune issue, or dementia, etc) today, when did that diagnosis become inevitable? Yesterday? Last year? How do we know that the harm will manifest itself immediately?
> If I started a new car company, and it put out it's first mass market vehicle, would you accept me saying "yeah, it's a car, it works like every other car out there, it has 4 wheels and drives down the road", would you assume it has the same reliability and safety record as an equivalent Honda or Toyota?
This analogy doesn't make sense.
It's my first mass-market vehicle, but it's already been tested more than 7 billion times. You as the driver are not a crash-test dummy.
Even if you were, your alternative is not "don't drive a car" or "drive a safer car". Your alternative is to get into a car that we know is dangerous (i.e. being at risk of contracting Covid).
> If someone was diagnosed with cancer (or an autoimmune issue, or dementia, etc) today, when did that diagnosis become inevitable? Yesterday? Last year? How do we know that the harm will manifest itself immediately?
Because the vaccine can't continue to affect the person when it's out of their system. The vaccine is entirely gone within a couple of months, and only the immune system's "learning" remains.
And while you're asking these questions about the vaccine, why not ask them about the disease itself? We aren't speculating about the disease, either. We know that it causes long-term issues in a lot of people, potentially including brain and heart damage.
This analogy doesn't make sense.
It's my first mass-market vehicle, but it's already been tested more than 7 billion times. You as the driver are not a crash-test dummy.
Even if you were, your alternative is not "don't drive a car" or "drive a safer car". Your alternative is to get into a car that we know is dangerous (i.e. being at risk of contracting Covid).
> If someone was diagnosed with cancer (or an autoimmune issue, or dementia, etc) today, when did that diagnosis become inevitable? Yesterday? Last year? How do we know that the harm will manifest itself immediately?
Because the vaccine can't continue to affect the person when it's out of their system. The vaccine is entirely gone within a couple of months, and only the immune system's "learning" remains.
And while you're asking these questions about the vaccine, why not ask them about the disease itself? We aren't speculating about the disease, either. We know that it causes long-term issues in a lot of people, potentially including brain and heart damage.
> This analogy doesn't make sense.
Do you truly think this doesn't apply at all? I see a lot of people say "it's a vaccine, we know how vaccines work", just like I'm saying "it's a car, we know how cars work".
In reality, implementation details matter. A Tesla isn't a Ford (and especially wasn't for the first GA model). You can predict some things, like maybe the body will rust in similar places. But what does a gas tank tell you about how a battery will hold up over time?
> Because the vaccine can't continue to affect the person when it's out of their system. The vaccine is entirely gone within a couple of months, and only the immune system's "learning" remains.
This is a prediction that comes from our experience with other makes/models of vaccines, and one that will hopefully come true. In the case of a never infected/never vaccinated person, I'd put my money on that prediction based on what I've heard about covid. For a person who has already recovered, leaning on that prediction feels unnecessarily risky, especially when as you say, we don't fully understand the long term risks of covid either. Why add more risk on top of that?
Do you truly think this doesn't apply at all? I see a lot of people say "it's a vaccine, we know how vaccines work", just like I'm saying "it's a car, we know how cars work".
In reality, implementation details matter. A Tesla isn't a Ford (and especially wasn't for the first GA model). You can predict some things, like maybe the body will rust in similar places. But what does a gas tank tell you about how a battery will hold up over time?
> Because the vaccine can't continue to affect the person when it's out of their system. The vaccine is entirely gone within a couple of months, and only the immune system's "learning" remains.
This is a prediction that comes from our experience with other makes/models of vaccines, and one that will hopefully come true. In the case of a never infected/never vaccinated person, I'd put my money on that prediction based on what I've heard about covid. For a person who has already recovered, leaning on that prediction feels unnecessarily risky, especially when as you say, we don't fully understand the long term risks of covid either. Why add more risk on top of that?
> A drug that has been given 7.5 billion times is not experimental.
You're supposed to bake a cake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. You can't bake it at 3500 degrees for 3 minutes instead.
> Also, the way we know that it won't have adverse effects in the future is that the vaccine doesn't persist in your system. If it's going to harm you, the harm will be in the short term. It can't just pop up again in 6 months.
Is alpha-gal syndrome fake? If not, then what exactly from the tick bite persists in your system forever afterwards?
You're supposed to bake a cake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. You can't bake it at 3500 degrees for 3 minutes instead.
> Also, the way we know that it won't have adverse effects in the future is that the vaccine doesn't persist in your system. If it's going to harm you, the harm will be in the short term. It can't just pop up again in 6 months.
Is alpha-gal syndrome fake? If not, then what exactly from the tick bite persists in your system forever afterwards?
Alpha-gal is an immune response. If a vaccine caused the allergy or triggered the immune response, you would see it in the short-term. It wouldn't appear years later, long after the vaccine was gone.
"Do your own research" is disingenuous. If I do my own research (and I have) and it disagrees with your beliefs, you'll still tell me I'm wrong.
Incidentally, people thinking for themselves and being able to look at studies and talk to (actual) experts directly without the interference of the media or "experts" is exactly why there are so many skeptics, and why the White House, the Media, and Big Tech are doing everything they can to censor the living shit out of vaccine discussion. You people spent years yammering about how great the free, uncensored discussion on the Internet would be: finally the strongest ideas would win out! And then when people didn't come flooding to YOUR ideas, but actually started to move AWAY from them, you screamed for it to all be shut down, post-haste. The game is only good when you win, huh?
Incidentally, people thinking for themselves and being able to look at studies and talk to (actual) experts directly without the interference of the media or "experts" is exactly why there are so many skeptics, and why the White House, the Media, and Big Tech are doing everything they can to censor the living shit out of vaccine discussion. You people spent years yammering about how great the free, uncensored discussion on the Internet would be: finally the strongest ideas would win out! And then when people didn't come flooding to YOUR ideas, but actually started to move AWAY from them, you screamed for it to all be shut down, post-haste. The game is only good when you win, huh?
> If I do my own research (and I have) and it disagrees with your beliefs, you'll still tell me I'm wrong.
My beliefs aren't beliefs. They are based on widely-reproduced and reproducible scientific research. If all of that research is wrong, it would fundamentally overturn human understanding (such as it is) of the immune system and also require a massive global conspiracy including thousands of scientists.
What in your research has told you that the vaccine is more dangerous than Covid? You also don't know the long-term effects of Covid exposure, right?
> Incidentally...
I'm not sure how to respond to this, but the link I provided was to MIT, not the White House, media, or big tech. I don't know who "you people" is, but I'm not part of any organized group, and "media" and "big tech" are not homogeneous either. Even "White House" isn't, because there are many conservative Republicans encouraging vaccination in conjunction with Democrats.
To you rpoint about censorsip: vaccine discussion (including profit-motivated disinformation) is not very well-censored, apparently[1]. And you are welcome to have open, uncensorable vaccine discussions with anyone you want, including any doctor who will give you an appointment. You just can't do it through some private companies' servers. Some of the major "Big Tech" platforms (WhatsApp, Telegram, private Facebook groups, Messenger, Instagram DMs, etc.) are also fully open to any vaccine discussion.
1. https://apnews.com/article/the-facebook-papers-covid-vaccine...
My beliefs aren't beliefs. They are based on widely-reproduced and reproducible scientific research. If all of that research is wrong, it would fundamentally overturn human understanding (such as it is) of the immune system and also require a massive global conspiracy including thousands of scientists.
What in your research has told you that the vaccine is more dangerous than Covid? You also don't know the long-term effects of Covid exposure, right?
> Incidentally...
I'm not sure how to respond to this, but the link I provided was to MIT, not the White House, media, or big tech. I don't know who "you people" is, but I'm not part of any organized group, and "media" and "big tech" are not homogeneous either. Even "White House" isn't, because there are many conservative Republicans encouraging vaccination in conjunction with Democrats.
To you rpoint about censorsip: vaccine discussion (including profit-motivated disinformation) is not very well-censored, apparently[1]. And you are welcome to have open, uncensorable vaccine discussions with anyone you want, including any doctor who will give you an appointment. You just can't do it through some private companies' servers. Some of the major "Big Tech" platforms (WhatsApp, Telegram, private Facebook groups, Messenger, Instagram DMs, etc.) are also fully open to any vaccine discussion.
1. https://apnews.com/article/the-facebook-papers-covid-vaccine...
>I had previously not understood how people could get themselves so deep into conspiracy theories.
To put it simply, it is contrarianism at the core. The more someone pushes the more you push back. The only fix for such a mindset is for the push to stop, but since the push works for the majority of non-contrarians it's worth the pushing. You can apply this to just about anything controversial in society/politics: gun rights, abortion, sexuality, religion, taxation, medication, etc.
The best thing you can do at an individual level is pull -- that is, agree with them as much as you can, be compassionate and empathetic with their views, but be firm in your own beliefs and highlight the overlap, then draw them closer to that overlap.
To put it simply, it is contrarianism at the core. The more someone pushes the more you push back. The only fix for such a mindset is for the push to stop, but since the push works for the majority of non-contrarians it's worth the pushing. You can apply this to just about anything controversial in society/politics: gun rights, abortion, sexuality, religion, taxation, medication, etc.
The best thing you can do at an individual level is pull -- that is, agree with them as much as you can, be compassionate and empathetic with their views, but be firm in your own beliefs and highlight the overlap, then draw them closer to that overlap.
I think you need citations for everything you wrote there. We do have a lot of research into how people come to believe conspiracy theories and (to a lesser extent) how to break them out of it.
Most of what I've read agrees that pushing those people and/or treating them without empathy is the wrong approach. But the cause is not always contrarianism, and vaccine skepticism is not a perfect analog for the other controversial issues you mentioned. Tellingly, vaccination wasn't a political or controversial issue for many decades in the US.
Most of what I've read agrees that pushing those people and/or treating them without empathy is the wrong approach. But the cause is not always contrarianism, and vaccine skepticism is not a perfect analog for the other controversial issues you mentioned. Tellingly, vaccination wasn't a political or controversial issue for many decades in the US.
> Tellingly, vaccination wasn't a political or controversial issue for many decades in the US.
That's because we've never gone from "a vaccine doesn't exist for this disease" to "literally everyone in the world needs to take this new vaccine right now" so quickly before.
That's because we've never gone from "a vaccine doesn't exist for this disease" to "literally everyone in the world needs to take this new vaccine right now" so quickly before.
By the same measure, I don't want to spend much time around people who:
1. Blindly accept what the government, the media, and "experts" tell them, despite all three repeatedly demonstrating they're not trustworthy.
2. Continually parrot false claims about the vaccine's efficacy, and dismiss any study, doctor, nurse or academic that disagrees with the Official Narrative as wonks or Russian Operatives (has that one fallen out of style yet?)
3. CUT PEOPLE OUT OF THE LABOR MARKET, out of jobs they need, in the middle of a LABOR SHORTAGE, because they refuse to take highly suspicious medication the government is forcing on them.
The whole vaccine situation handling by the government has been nothing short of tyrannical. If the government can force you to take an unknown injection whenever they like, on penalty of being cut off from society, do any of your other rights even matter? You're probably the type that constantly cried "Fascist!" during the Trump years, and yet you're cheering on an authoritarian take-over of the US, by both government and Big Tech.
1. Blindly accept what the government, the media, and "experts" tell them, despite all three repeatedly demonstrating they're not trustworthy.
2. Continually parrot false claims about the vaccine's efficacy, and dismiss any study, doctor, nurse or academic that disagrees with the Official Narrative as wonks or Russian Operatives (has that one fallen out of style yet?)
3. CUT PEOPLE OUT OF THE LABOR MARKET, out of jobs they need, in the middle of a LABOR SHORTAGE, because they refuse to take highly suspicious medication the government is forcing on them.
The whole vaccine situation handling by the government has been nothing short of tyrannical. If the government can force you to take an unknown injection whenever they like, on penalty of being cut off from society, do any of your other rights even matter? You're probably the type that constantly cried "Fascist!" during the Trump years, and yet you're cheering on an authoritarian take-over of the US, by both government and Big Tech.
I had previously not understood how people could get themselves so deep into conspiracy theories. Now it’s obvious.
The next step with this sort of thing is of course that someone starts selling a “cure” for the vaccine that is harmless, but is fraudulent and scamming people.