Norwegian officials have said the elderly patients died of their underlying illnesses, not from the vaccine. 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.
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 a blog post, Kennedy scoffed at autopsy results that concluded a Portuguese woman’s death was unrelated to a vaccine. Kennedy Jr., are already inflaming fears about a handful of deaths - mostly in Europe - that have followed the worldwide rollout of immunizations. “Even if we come back later and say, “No, had nothing to do with vaccination, it was coronary artery disease,’ the damage has already been done.”Īnti-vaccine groups such as the National Vaccine Information Center and Children’s Health Defense, founded by Robert F. “You get one chance to make a first impression,” Osterholm said. Public health officials need to do a better job communicating the risks - real and imagined - from vaccines, said Osterholm, who has been advising President Joe Biden on the pandemic since his election. “They will make assumptions that it’s cause and effect.” he had a heart attack,” Osterholm said on his weekly podcast. “The media will write a story that John Doe got his vaccine at 8 a.m.
Public health officials “are not ready” for the onslaught of news and social media stories to come, he cautioned. “They will sensationalize anything that happens after someone gets a vaccine and attribute it to the vaccine,” Hotez said.Īs 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.įor example, in a group of 10 million people - about the number of Americans who have been vaccinated so far - nearly 800 people ages 55 to 64 typically die of heart attacks or coronary disease in one week, Osterholm said. Now, the same groups are blaming patients’ coincidental medical problems on covid shots, even when it’s clear that age or underlying health conditions are to blame, Hotez said. Peter Hotez, an infectious diseases specialist and author of “Preventing the Next Pandemic: Vaccine Diplomacy in a Time of Anti-Science.”Īnti-vaccine groups have falsely claimed for decades that childhood vaccines cause autism, weaving fantastic conspiracy theories involving government, Big Business and the media. “This is exactly what anti-vaccine groups do,” said Dr. In some cases, anti-vaccine activists are fabricating stories of deaths that never occurred. It can be republished for free.Īnti-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.