Will Macron have to make the Covid-19 vaccine compulsory? Credit: JEAN-PHILIPPE KSIAZEK/AFP via Getty Images
![](https://unherd.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/John-100x100.jpg)
Here is a pretty conundrum. France, cradle of the enlightenment and birthplace of Cartesian logic, is also a snake-pit of conspiracy theories. French “touch-and-see” rationalism and French “it’s-all-a giant-fiddle” scepticism sometimes align. They can also collide. And nowhere is this more true than for vaccinations. France, the home of Louis Pasteur, of Pierre and Marie Curie, is more opposed to them than any other country in the world.
The news of the Pfizer and BioNTech breakthrough in the development of a vaccine against Covid-19 was greeted across the world with cautious relief and delight. In France, there was some delight — but also suspicion and even anger. International research by Gallup last year reported that one in three French people believed all vaccines to be dangerous — the highest percentage of the 144 countries surveyed. This week, an Ipsos survey suggested that 46% of French adults will refuse — or say they will refuse — the Pfizer jab or any other kind of anti-Covid jab. (Compared to 36% in the United States, 30% in Germany, 21% in Britain and 16% in India.)
Strangely, opposition appears to have increased as the vaccine looked more likely to appear. An Ipsos survey in September found that 41% of French adults would refuse any Covid jab. With “herd immunity” estimated to require 60 to 70% coverage of a given population, the pandemic appears to have a long and prosperous future in France.
Anti-vax feeling has been spreading throughout the developed word in recent years (much less so in poorer countries, which know a thing or two about infectious diseases). But why should the opposition be so powerful in France? Are the survey figures reliable?
Laurent-Henri Vignaud, a French historian who has studied the rise and fall of anti-vax movements, is sceptical. It’s not always a good idea, he suggests, to take the French public at its word — and certainly not on this subject. “The only other countries broadly as anti-vaccine as the French are the Russians and the Mongolians,” he says. “Countries where government is widely held in disrepute. What we are looking at here, I think, is a transfer of suspicion. For many years 30-40% of the French have been vastly sceptical of all politicians and all media.”
He concludes that, “this deep pessimism has spilled over to the question of vaccines”. Wide-scale rejection of mainstream politics exists in other countries, but takes an especially acute form in France, where the traditional centre-Left/centre-Right pattern of politics has all but collapsed. The poor performance of recent governments offers a partial explanation. But France’s aggressively suspicious attitude towards authority is not a new phenomenon.
As he describes it, there is a core of people who are viscerally anti-vax, “people who use arguments on natural health or because they believe conspiracy theories of the far-Right or the far-Left”. But there is another group, he says, who are simply sceptical or negative about whatever the government proposes. “But I doubt they will all refuse in the end to take a Covid vaccine?” he says.
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SubscribeSorry, this article is nauseating. Before a mass vaccination programme it is reasonable for people to discuss what is involved: the limitations of the products, the limitations of knowledge, the limitations of the integrity of the people peddling the products. You may point to people saying silly things or apparently silly things. But this is nothing compared with the authoritarianism and lack of integrity of those trying to shut everyone up. The fundamental basis of this article is ad hominem disparagement of people the author does not like and unfounded intellectual superiority (since there are no quality arguments about the science). We are reaching a low ebb in the history of civilisation.
“The fundamental basis of this article is ad hominem disparagement of people the author does not like and unfounded intellectual superiority (since there are no quality arguments about the science)”
YES!.
The use of the term ‘anti-vaxxers’ in the title of this article blatantly ignores the fact that the vast majority of the skeptical people, like myself, is not against vaccination in general but has – like hundreds of thousands of scientists and medical practitioners worldwide – specific and valid questions/doubts about the need for a vaccine. Shame on you John Lichfield for framing this discussion, shame on you.
Absolutely – please note my letter. BMJ on-line John Stone, ‘Regarding the Use of the Term “Anti-Vaxxer”’, 27 August 2020.
Actually John if you were as informed as myself about vaccine “science” you would join myself in declaring to be indeed “anti-vax”. That’s even though I have published the definitive proof that the autism increase was not caused by vaccines, but by dental amalgam mercury instead (I will post links below this). Here’s excerpt from the book Experts Catastrophe, commenting on vaccine “science”:
~~~~~
Vaccines appear to fit into the same third-rate paradigm as other issuings from the pharma trade. As with other drugs, first an exclusive patented profitable product is identified and then money is invested in persuading everyone that it is crucially important. I think you should consider a recent book titled “Dissolving Illusions: Disease, Vaccines, and The Forgotten History” (Humphries & Bystrianyk, 2013). And a more recent one by Tetyana Obukhanych, who got a PhD in immunology then on reflection decided her education had been very defective anyway. On the internet you can see some of the fanatical personal attacks such non-conforming authors get subjected to by corporate-aligned people.
You could also consider these comments from a study recently published in a top peer-reviewed journal (Wang et al., 2014).
“The reported coverage of the measles”“rubella (MR) or measles”“mumps”“rubella (MMR) vaccine is greater than 99% in Zhejiang province. However, the incidence of measles, mumps, and rubella remains high. …. measles, mumps, and rubella remain common diseases throughout Zhejiang province. …. Therefore, the elimination of measles and control of mumps and rubella are urgent public health priorities in local regions.”
Note that this report is telling us that not just one but all three famous infections (measles, mumps and rubella) have not been effectively countered even by 99% double-coverage of those vaccinations in a population of 50 million. This huge study alone suffices to cast large doubts on the vaccine industry’s scientific credibility.
But maybe you are thinking that that Wang report is just a one-off anomaly, like the famous anecdotal report of men landing on the moon. Well, here are three more I have learned of from Tetyana Obukhanych:
Nkowane et al 1987 Measles outbreak in a vaccinated school population: epidemiology, chains of transmission, and the role of vaccine failures. Am J Public Health.
Boullane et al 1991 Major measles epidemic in the region of Quebec despite a 99% vaccine coverage. Canadian J Public Health.
Sutcliffe et al 1996 Outbreak of measles in a highly vaccinated secondary school population. Canadian Med Assocn.
The evidence highlighted by Dr Obukhanych and others shows that measles vaccines do indeed generate some sort of immunity, but that it usually lasts only a few months or years, in contrast to the lifelong immunity created by having a relatively trivial natural measles infection in childhood. And this has two adverse consequences. Firstly it increases the risk of measles in older people, for whom it can be more harmful. And secondly it prevents mothers passing on their immunity to their babies, with the result that those infants lack that natural protection and are thus at risk of an infection which can be deadly at that unnatural age.
Four further things reflect this dubiousness of vaccine science. Firstly that their manufacturers have been granted some peculiar exemption from the normal legal liability for harm caused. Secondly that they are not required to prove actual effectiveness, but merely that they generate some antibodies, even though there is a lot more to the immune system than those antibodies which clearly don’t have effects equivalent to those of the infections themselves. Thirdly….
Experts Catastrophe book (written before covid):
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0…
Review showing that vaccinations did not cause the autism increase: http://www.pseudoexpertise.com/ch-...
Report showing that the autism increase has been caused by dental amalgam mercury: http://www.pseudoexpertise.com/ch-...
delete
Experts Catastrophe book (written before covid): www. amazon com/dp/0999578006/
Review showing that vaccinations did not cause the autism increase: www pseudoexpertise com/ch-6.pdf
Report showing that the autism increase has been caused by dental amalgam mercury: www pseudoexpertise com/ch-3.pdf
Absolutely, and very well put, for what is a narrow minded point of view put forward in the article and the mindset that has contributed this situation in the first nsatance!
The use of anti-vaxxers is intentional. Its purpose is to make your skepticism appear as illegitimate if not morally suspect. It is the type of language used by people with no interest in healthy debate and a strong desire to use coercion.
But also the idea that “antivax” views be banned from the media was started by the CEO of the vaccine cartel organisation GAVI, Seth Berkley, in an article in the Spectator in 2017 – it was evident that this encompassed not just alleged ideologues but any criticism at all of vaccine products. The British government have poured billions into GAVI since 2011 and Boris Johnson started to spray around the “antivaxxer” term within a month of taking office as Prime Minister (having previously pledged to support free speech). Perhaps few would have recognised what a deviation this was as the time, but it looms very large now, and it represents a dirty technocratic agenda.
I agree with you Frederik. As soon as someone questions the validity or the safety, we are automatically deemed ‘anti-vaxxer”.
Surely it just shows the French are a well-educated and deep thinking folk. They are right to be very suspicious of any vaccine developed so quickly, tested so lightly, and whose long term effects are unknown. Common sense.
They may also wonder if a relatively mild virus deserves such a heavy response, but that is another matter.
“They may also wonder if a relatively mild virus deserves such a heavy response, but that is another matter.” I think this is the matter of the problem. Why so adamant that we all get this with potential threats of mandatory – just like in masks. We have every reason to question this whole thing.
Why shouldn’t we be suspicious? When has a vaccine been developed as quickly as this and trials over in weeks? This morning Boris’s message from isolation was that it did not matter that he had already been infected with Covid and had antibodies, the important thing was to isolate when told. If antibodies do not matter, then why is a vaccine so important?
I have not seen a published paper on the Pfizer results, but all it reported was a small number of people who had symptoms with no indication of how serious. The missing information was how many people had been exposed to the virus. I assume these were all healthy volunteers but the first to be given the virus will be the vulnerable with other serious health conditions. How do we know there are no side effects? We don’t because the relevant testing has not been done. We are now being threatened with anti-vaccine views being treated as a crime.
“Why shouldn’t we be suspicious?”
Don’t be suspicious because the BBC will call you names like conspiracy theorist. That’s about the only reason not to be.
It’s the language of the left* used to shut down any opposing view because they find it impossible to debate real issues
* see also
Climate Denier
Covidiot
Anti-masker
Racist (Brexiteer)
Thick (Brexiteer)……
Also the left come out of humanities department and need graphs explained to them in words of 25 syllables or more.
They not only have no idea what the science might mean in brass tacks terms, they have no idea of evaluating the quality of what any single scientist is saying, other than by the colour of their lipstick.
Was not aware that our PM was on “the left”, yet he is on “their side” on Covid. Nor the leaders of France, Australia, Germany, etc etc. To me it appears our responses to are cutting right through the political divide. I bet there are plenty of “Brexiteer” who are also pro-lockdown and masks, because they are afraid of getting the disease, so are they now on the “left”?. From your list I would personally also switch from the “left” to “right” depending on the matter in hand! I think the real problem is the labelling itself, whoever is doing it – left, right, in, out, shake it all about…
Helen, you’re right to call me out for my over-generalizations here, but in my defence I had just read this
“Labour Calls For Censorship of Anti-Vaxx ‘Misinformation’ on Social Media
The Labour Party has demanded the Government do more to force social media companies to remove “dangerous anti-vax content”. Sky News has more…..”
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wi…
‘… psychiatry was used to disable and remove from society political opponents (“dissidents”) who openly expressed beliefs that contradicted the official dogma’ And ‘Article 190-1 “Dissemination of fabrications known to be false, which defame the Soviet political and social system”‘
With “herd immunity” estimated to require 60 to 70% coverage of a given population, the pandemic appears to have a long and prosperous future in France.
=============
Take the known case fatality rate. Take the number of deaths. Divide the number of deaths by the CFR and you get a 4 week lag number for the number of infections.
In the UK that’s 35 million have already been infected. 30% of the population have immunity from other CV infections. 19.5 million on top. Call it 55 million out of a 65 million population
We are already at 84% of the population with immunity. All Government numbers and published research.
It will be the same in France .There’s no need for a vaccination bar making lots of money and deliberately trashing the economy.
That’s why you have “advisors” with 600K investments in big pharma pushing their “solutions”>
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This is a false argument that you commonly see as a misunderstanding
of what can accurately be deduced from the CFR. The CFR is the
probability of dying if you catch the disease. It is incorrect logic
to use it to back calculate the number of people that must have been
infected.
For example, if a
disease has a CFR of 1% and 100 people have been infected,
statistically it is likely one person will die, but it could be 0 or
more than 1
What you cannot
conclude is that if one person has died, therefore 100 people must
have been infected.
It is a basic error
of logic that if A implies B, then to assert that B implies A.
Can it not be inferred from the number of positive tests – recently around 50,000 / day?
The CFR for this virus is 0.12% globally.
Doesn’t it mean that 1% CFR => 100 infections per death +/- error margins? Otherwise what’s the point of the figure and where did it come from if not expressing deaths : infections?
That would be true statistically over time if all the population had the same risk, but where the CFR differs wildly in different subgroups you cannot back calculate from observed deaths to number of cases.
To give a simple, albeit unlikely, illlustration, assume we have 2 groups each 100 patients. Group 1 has a CFR of 0.1% and group a CFR of 100%. There will have been 100 deaths most likely in 200 people, so an overall CFR of 50%. If you are then told there has been 1 death in 200 similar people, you would then conclude there has been 2 infections. However there must have been one infection in group 2 and they died, but possibly a considerable and unknown number from group 1 where the CFR is very low. You can make no useful conclusions using this method to estimate cases.
The CFR is calculated from deaths:cases, so taking the measured CFR you know how many people had been infected (back calculating in your terminology), it’s just re-arranging the terms of the equation. It’s statistically valid for the population because it’s a statistic of the population. If you split the population into sub-groups then you can calculate the CFR for each group and then given the number of deaths in a group plug the figure in to get a reasonable estimate of infections for that group. I think people are aware that the chances of dying depend on which group they are in – i.e., risk factors. It’s still statistically valid that given the number of deaths in a population you can back calculate the number of infections from the measured CFR.
When you use only 1 death an example of course that may have resulted from between 1-100 infected people so the margin of error is enormous but if you look at larger numbers of deaths the margin of error closes so your example is flawed.
The example is purely to show that dividing number of deaths by CFR cannot give a reliable estimate of cases, and this it correct regardless of numbers. This is especially likely when the CFR seems to vary by over 1000 between individuals in the population.
You attempt to smear and denigrate people who don’t want (or need) a vaccine, as “anti-vaxxers”, is bloody offensive. Your implication is as if it was some form of mental deficiency, but in fact the reverse is true. The ones who are “all for it”, tend to be clueless and uninformed. They don’t know about how the immune system works, what the science behind the virus is, and what the agenda is of those who are pushing it. When you understand the science and true statistics behind this virus, you wouldn’t want a bloody vaccine. There’s no need for one.
Ne’er a truer word was spoken. Well done Sir.
Actually this conceited language is really useful for sorting out who are the intolerant narrow-minded authoritarians and for usefully peeing off a high proportion of readers who might otherwise be believers. Even better the censorship, what better way to promote a message than to get it known that it is being censored.
Do you have to be in support of vaccines to be able to write for “Unherd”? I would prefer a real discussion rather than the usual arguments one hears in mainstream media. I would challenge the author to read Dr Suzanne Humphries’ book “Dissolving Illusions” as a start. She became sceptical as a doctor when seeing the negative consequences of vaccines on her patients. Our daughter was severely damaged by vaccines and it took us years to restore her health to some degree (ezcema, asthma, allergies ranging to anaphylaxis). Her husband was not so fortunate, he is still badly affected by ezcema, 25 years later. I would also challenge you to do your research on the new mRNA vaccines to make up your mind if they are really safe. It is a new type of vaccine that changes your DNA, something that has never done before. The EU had to change the regulation concerning genetic manipulation to allow for these new techniques. In contrast to frequent claims, it is actually the educated people who question the narrative, among them many people in healthcare.
Agree wholeheartedly. The articles regarding the vaccine on this site are HERD, not UNHERD. Can we really have something UNHERD, like say by Ivor Cummings, or from Sweden regarding herd immunity.
Thank heavens here are some people with sense. Why do we even need a vaccine for a disease with a negligible mortality rate which is concentrated in a very specific section of the population? This is not disease control, it is people control; the WEF is behind covid passports.
While there are no doubt all sorts of loons who get their rocks off by believing in bunkum, it seems that ““ yet again! ““ there is a conflation of conspiracy theorists and perfectly sensible people who are more than a little skeptical about subjecting their bodies to vaccines developed by profit-hungry companies that are under massive pressure by governments worldwide to deliver a silver bullet.
I am not against vaccinations as such, but I am highly uncomfortable with this one. The story of COVID-19 is one of gross incompetence. In the winter, the authorities told us COVID-19 was not a problem, and anyway, we were ready. Then in March, when it turned out they hadn’t quite got that one right, they told us not to wear masks. In the summer, they made us wear masks ““ apparently, this was the only way to get back to some semblance of normality and avoid lockdowns. Now we have masks and lockdowns. You’re asking me to place my trust in these very governments officials and a pharmaceutical giant whose raison d’être is the bottom line? I don’t think so.
The tobacco industry hid science that proved the incredible toxicity of its product. Same for big oil and VW hid the true scale of toxic emissions of its vehicles to deceive the Government.
But but but if you doubt big Pharma you are a crazy nutter who needs to have their free speech suppressed or maybe even go to jail immediately.
Fascinating.
One reason why “anti-vaxxers” refuse vaccines is manufacturer exemptions from indemnification granted by government. It’s blanket use has done little to engender a sense of safety. The manufacturer protections are even greater for the COVID vaccine. While an injury due to vaccine case may be submitted to the Vaccine Injury Board little is done with that information.
We would never tolerate new drugs being authorized for use without the possibility of legal recourse if injury occurred. The mere fact that vaccine manufacturers enjoy this protection from harm, harm that they may cause raises eyebrows.
If just this biased legal tip of the hat was terminated and full liability applied many who question vaccines safety and motives might see them in a different light.
The data of this virus tells us that there is no need for a vaccine, so I think it is more worrying the blind trust of the pro-vaccine.
I got very angry reading this shoddy opinion piece on UnHerd, perhaps naively thinking this was the place to read intelligent, informed writing. So I’m very relieved to read through the comments to find that the majority of subscribers are a lot more intelligent than the author of this article.
the comments section is always a good read and usually far more insightful than the article.
Elon Musk claims he got 4 Covid tests in one day done. 2 were negative, 2 were positive.
Hmm – assuming he’s telling the truth – the test appears to be random. We’re told it works and is the basis for all public policy like lockdowns and masks because of ‘rising infection rates’.
But of course, the vaccine works. Don’t connect the dots of abject failure of testing to potential failure and possible danger of vaccine. Be very, very scared of Covid, but the medical system has shown it is totally on top of the situation through testing, so trust that vaccine.
You heard it here – if you don’t trust it, it’s because of ‘transference of government mistrust’ or ‘conspiracy theory.’ Can’t just be looking at the evidence that the medical system is committing global fraud with it’s testing, therefore, it may well be committing a far more dangerous global fraud with vaccine.
That’s impossible, you conspiracy theorist.
Lichfield is primed to believe certain things but he does not know why he believes them. The technocratic class have let us down at every stage so far, acquiring undreamt of powers (and more to come) in the space of a year, meanwhile handing huge public contracts to their friends. The time to trust any of this is gone.
Its interesting the two vaccine tests I’ve seen any figures for so far quote for the placebo population c22,000 with c98 covid positives (I’ve forgotten the exact figure but it was <100) and the other a placebo population of 15,000 with 90 cases of which 11 were serious.
Is this the MO now: not wanting to be guinea pig = anti-vaxxer, much like skepticism = climate denier.
The home of Pasteur ? – more important the home of Bechamp – whose work Pasteur stole – The fraudulent Pasteur gave us the modern version of Germ theory which gave us unproven virus theory and Bechamp gave us the opposite and was ignored as Pasteur had the patronage of Louis and his court. Research is available in a cheap Kindle book on Amazon
And did Pasteur not recant towards the end of his life and say Bechamp was right and that the soil was everything?
As far as I know he said “the terrain”, which would apply to the enviroment, i.e. the body, which is a true observation. A healthy body can handle most things, even Covid-19….
Exactly! It’s a neat observation which also could relate to how we grow food as well as ourselves.
This isn’t really about the vaccine. It’s about training the masses to assent to yet even more government coercion in their lives. All for their own good, of course.
The underlying problem is ordinary people have been increasingly losing faith in politicians for decades. Politicians have been using tame “experts” like a drunk uses a lamppost – more for support than illumination. People are now increasingly losing faith in all “experts”, but especially the tame ones. The way governments are pandering to wokedom to control discourse just makes the problem worse. Taking this yet another absurd step further into insanity is the latest cry from Sir Kier to pass a law to ban anti-vax speech.
What people need to realise, and politicians and scientists need to openly admit, is there are far fewer real facts and truths than they have been leading us to believe and that proper rational open debate is what is needed ahead of a risk balanced decision for society, which those who don’t want to take the risk personally you don’t have to.
If you remove Mr Lichfield’s repeated ridicule of people who have reservations about taking a COVID 19 vaccine, there is very little to his argument. Why is he immune to having to actually explain why his position is right? Is it enough to just label those that disagree the lunatic fringe? Even he points out that quite a large number of people don’t share his enthusiasm for a vaccine generally, and this vaccine in particular. And judging by his lack of evidence for his view it may well be that the other side has done a bit more actual research than him. He refers to COVID-19 as a “deadly new disease” however I note even the WHO website clearly states the following: “FACT: Most people who get COVID-19 recover from it. Most people who get COVID-19 have mild or moderate symptoms and can recover thanks to supportive care.”
On Monday, The Times reported that GCHQ ‘has begun an offensive cyber-operation to disrupt anti-vaccine propaganda’.
This is the Orwellian world we now find ourselves in.
This article by Mr Lichfield is full of the usual lazy cliches about ‘conspiracy theorists’ and so-called ‘anti-vaxxers’. I expect to read this kind of brainless smear journalism on many other websites like CNN or the BBC, but the reason I came to UnHerd is because it was providing a refreshing perspective on the virus with many excellent interviews done by Freddie Sayers. But recently, along with the predictable ‘pro-vaccine’ articles by Mr. Chivers, UnHerd seems to be becoming very much like The Herd. Why ?
A disappointing piece of old school propaganda. I had hoped for better from UnHerd. One does not have to believe in “far right or far left” conspiracy theories to be suspicious of vaccines. One only has to do one’s own research rather than lazily rely on what governments and pharmaceutical companies tell us. And as both are hardly uninterested parties, not reliable sources of information about vaccines. The US CDC owns an array of vaccine patents from which they expect to profit, yet they pose as a disinterested public health body.
Dear .Unherd
Coronavirus: NHS staff flock to anti-vax group (The Times)
Th e TImes /edition/news/coronavirus-nhs-staff-flock-to-anti-vax-group-k8sq7q63w
Hundreds of NHS and care home staff have formed a group opposed to vaccinations, wearing masks and testing in hospitals.
The group, NHS Workers for Choice, No Restrictions for Declining a Vaccine, has gained more than 250 Facebook members in a month. They include a GP, several accident and emergency nurses, healthcare assistants, lab workers, and private and public care home staff.
It says it is not an anti-vaccine group and exists to support healthcare workers, but The Times found posts saying that the Pfizer-BionTech coronavirus vaccine was a new frozen virus, similar to smallpox, to be “unleashed” on the world. They compared it to “poison”.
One member who works in a GP’s surgery, said that she would rather quit than help with a vaccination
Out of an NHS staff of 1.4 million, that seems trivial.
The odds of the NHS having a few nuts on the staff is pretty much the same as any large organisation after all.
are much the same as the odds of people challenging medical pseudoscience being sneered at as “nuts”. In reality NHS people are scared to speak out, no whistleblower ever gets their job back and no blacklisting crook loses theirs. That 250 is the visible tip of a very large hidden iceberg of informed disbelief.
Unless the genuine issue is addressed articles like this will remain froth over substance. Skepticism of technocracies and belief in conspiracy theories are not the same thing. The tendency of technologists to seek quick, biased, self interested outcomes without regard for the consequences is a problem. The problems increase when they are given the badge of authority as “scientists”. They are not scientists, they are either businesses after profit or apparatchiks after power, or a mixture of both. Mertonian Norms are nothing to them. Thus far regulators have prevailed, so vaccines for MMR, polio, rabies etc are effective, with a tiny % of bad reactions or casualties. The apparent reduction of test, validation etc for the sake of expedience may mean the SARS CoV vaccines are more risky. The difficulty with testing adds to the risk. The guy who designed the PCR test points out it tests for T Cell and B Cell response not for SARS-CoV2. Even assuming the tests are broadly effective the CFR of 0.8 for SARS-CoV2 is so close to seasonal flu at 0.45 that vaccination is only really relevant to the elderly, vulnerable and co-morbidity sufferers. Add to the above the torment of care home residents, the suspension of civil rights, the withdrawal of NHS operations despite empty hospitals, the wilfull suppression of genuine scientists – Sikora, Heneghan, Gupta etc etc and you have a conspiracy theorists dream. However its not a conspiracy, just the worst instincts of humans overcoming our better nature at this point in time. As with all previous backward lurches in human progess we come out the other side wiser and stronger, if only by a small increment.
I am baffled by the media coverage being given throughout the world to a hypothetical widespread refusal to take a Covid vaccine. What purpose does it serve? In this day and age, it may encourage deep-seated contrariness (and not only among the French), an attitude that will tend not to change when sufficient facts are available.
Well-informed scepticism is justified here, given the short testing time, limited results available at this point, and previous vaccine rollout mishaps (H1N1, polio, etc.); and I’m not even considering the problematics of the supply chain for mRNA candidates. However, to extrapolate this into real, general opposition before the fact is misguided.
I think it’s to prepare us for the idea of mandatory vaccines.
By hypothesising widespread refusal the next stage would be mandating as a solution.
Although not a government paper, let alone a proposal in parliament (as concluded by fullfact.org/online/mandato…, a paper submitted at the government’s request by academics at the University of York and Oxford recommended that the government “should give serious consideration to compulsory immunisation as a means of reducing the impacts of Covid-19″ and ‘discusses the legalities around treating someone who is detained under the Mental Health Act’. This reminds me of the way dissidents in Eastern Europe / USSR were classified as mentally ill and in urgent need of re-education (and forced labour). I can imagine that there would be a sizeable constituency eager to implement it. More likely at this stage is to make vaccination a free choice followed by ‘Please show your Vac Cert to gain entry’ to shops, offices, transport etc, again implemented voluntarily in order to protect the vulnerable.
I doubt mandatory vaccines would be legal.
The media is not so much covering as attempting to influence by ham-fistedly trying to pain anyone skeptical about the vaccine as a tinfoil hat wearing crank. This movie has played before, most often with climate where any skepticism of the “evidence” is viewed as heresy.
Few people are willing guinea pigs, and many have learned that the media is not out to inform or persuade, it’s there to carry an agenda. Who knows. The vaccine may be the greatest thing since the polio shot, but no one can say for sure. Isn’t it odd that a business based on questioning everything seldom questions anything.
Lots of commenters here are not happy that Unherd is publishing articles like this, and the label “anti-vaxxer” certainly triggers me too. I wonder, though, if they have to publish these kinds of article to avoid the danger of being shut down? Faith in vaccination seems to be the new religion from whence our salvation will come, and we human beings haven’t proved very tolerant of those who question our religions. So it might be important to post such articles to stay on the right side of the censors, as, after all, Unherd is supposed to be open to all opinions?
I can’t believe I am reading so much common sense in one place as the readers comments on this article.
The most intelligent set of debating since the onset of this Covid nightmare.
These type of articles are getting more than boring. They can almost be picked up on demand on any street corner. Not just in their content, but in their rhetoric.
The author actually gets it correct, probably accidentally when he talks about vaccines being more popular in developing countries. Where vaccines like the measles vaccine may do some good in countries with little sanitation and low nutritional standards, but are doing more harm than good in the long term in developed countries.
Why we need a vaccine for a disease that 99.9pcent of us don’t catch or recover from after mainly mild symptoms is rather baffling, especially when there are perfectly good prophylactics and treatments around being used by thousands of docs. Raoult is a pioneer in this as is Zelenko, as was Cathcart many years ago as is (forget his name) with Salbutamol and Marik …… God forbid we mention chlorine dioxide which i have no doubt works. The sceptic in me suggests that all these treatments are cheap and if they work for covid they’ll work for other viruses. Oops, that’s a lot of expensive drugs like remdesivir now redundant!
There are some complete nutters out there, but even they do normally have points to take away. People labelled as ‘conspiracy theorists’ by the likes of the author show to me that they have done their homework and have thoughts outside of the mainstream and come to their own conclusions. They have normally done their own research. Rather than label them it would be better to listen to them and debate. Not the done thing by the likes of the author, if this article is his normal output.
I should just yawn at his rhetoric on Wakefield and ‘anti vax’ cos he’s not read, or ignored the real data. In fact I will – Yawn..zzzzzz…..
To the author – a big middle finger.
Questioning enforced medication is ALWAYS a right and a smart idea.
Questioning a rushed vaccine with a wall of politicized fear porn pushing a GoReC (Government Response to Covid) policy that is completely out of proportion to the threat. Yeah, Question It Hard.
You, author, line up and roll up the sleeve. I’ll wait for more data, please.
If there is one person in the world that I trust on these issues it is Bret Weinstein, and in his Dark Horse podcast #54 he is sceptical of any rushed vaccine for Covid.
Any chance of a time-reference (time code) for that video please? 1.14hrs is a bit much to listen to given that the majority of it seems not to be about this subject? Thank you!
I think it is quite early in the video. And perhaps it was even in the Dark Horse Q&A #54. I don’t remember, even though I watched them over the weekend. (I have already consumed numerous other podcasts since then, and read large parts of a couple of books, and it all blurs into one).
I spend a great deal of time in France and I would suggest the government relabel the vaccine as an antibiotic. The French will queue up to take it,
Or better still cross out the label “Pfizer” and put “Le Vaccine Tres Francais”
“Professor Didier Raoult, the Professor Dumbledore of Marseille, is an internationally recognised expert in infectious diseases and progenitor of the widely-debunked, but far from dead, Hydroxychloroquine craze.”
“Widely debunked” only in Mr. Lichfield’s fervid imagination and “wilful negativity”. I do note with pleasure that nearly all my fellow commenters strongly resist Mr. Lichfield’s smear tactics.
As a 68 year old living in France, about 2 months ago I received a letter inviting me to go and get a flu jab from my local pharmacie or doctor. I’ve never bothered to get a flu jab in the past, and I can’t remember the last time I had a bout of flu that caused me to take time off work, but on this occasion they seemed to imply it was my social / moral duty to get the jab, in case I got flu, and jammed up my local hospital unnecessarily because of complications. So I trotted down to my local pharmacie – not once, but three times – each time to be told that they had no supplies of the flu vaccine because demand had been so overwhelming. Ergo, I conclude that the French anti-vaxxers are all mouth and no trousers – they just love moaning.
Two of my comments just disappeared. Nothing even vaguely insulting, offensive, personal. Anyone know what the censors object to on this forum? Would it be links to cited material? Too many comments per unit time? If the censors are watching please let me know by email.
How disappointing to See this article in UnHerd – a publication I have come to rely on as considering all viewpoints, and especially those that are, well, unheard.
This is why. The death and pain vaccinations can bring, but you never seem to hear about.
https://violationtracker.go…
The French are right to be suspicious. France is the land of Bechamp, the great
reproach to Pasteur, whose work has been ignored (even suppressed) by
the western world for over a century, but it is truer to reality than
anything Pasteur said.
Essentially ““ and I apologise if this simplification does too much
violence to their respective theories ““ Bechamp held that a living
organism, in good health, was capable of defending itself against
assaults of illness. It was only when the health of the organism was
compromised that disease naturally attacked it. That our bodies are
teeming with bacteria good and bad, and the purpose of medicine is to
get the body back into balance so it can repel disease and return to
health.
Pasteur, on the other hand, held that ‘germs’, ie bacteria and
viruses range around ready to attack and unless they are destroyed they
will be dangerous to everybody irrespective of their health and habits.
This superficial ‘germ theory’ animates the western scientific
establishment and ‘big pharma’. It has driven the last hundred years of
vaccination and emphasis on ‘science’ being needed to protect us from
disease. It has culminated in this currrent COVID hysteria.
Any mention of Bechamp now brings down a torrent of vitriol. He was
subjected to all manner of attacks in his lifetime by Pasteur’s
followers, many of whom stood to profit from Pasteur’s theories. A good
many of Pasteur’s theories were plagiarised from the more subtle
research of Bechamp and passed as truth, when at best they were partial
and at worst downright false.
If Bechamp’s insight into the complexity and self-sustaining nature
of life were to be accepted by big pharma and the medical establishment,
they would be left high and dry. That’s why they are so fierce in their
denunciation of Bechamp and to this day, anybody who expresses even
mild support for his theories.
But when people talk of ‘herd immunity’ and the efficacy of Vitamin C
or D, or zinc, or fresh air and exercise, or washing your hands, they
are relying, whether they know it or not, on the natural processes that
Bechamp identified as sustaining life.
A quick Google search will show the bitter insults that Bechamp
attracts: he is a ‘crank’, in bed with ‘anti-vaxxers’, and ‘those who
believe that food is medicine’, practitioners of ‘alternative medicine’,
‘climate change deniers’ and ‘Covidiots’.
This begs the question why modern ‘scientists’ are so keen to rubbish and ‘cancel’ Bechamp?
Might it be that he’s on to something that threatens them? And might
it be that if we took notice of his advice most of the scientific
establishment and their big-business accolytes would not only look
foolish, but would find themselves in need of alternative employment?
I ask one simple question of the followers of Pasteur’s germ theory.
If Bechamp is wrong, as these ‘expert scientists’ claim, how is that
most people not only survive, but are mostly not affected by the myriad
bacteria and viruses that assail us daily?
The French have always been more sensible than the British. Vaccines are not categorically safe and you only have to read the leaflet in the packet to know that.
The French have also not fallen sway to the anti-homeopathy brigade in the way the British have. They retain more open minds, in regard to various medical modalities, and indeed, with a brilliant food culture, have always known, in ways the British have not, that you are what you eat and that food and wine are also medicine.
Questioning vaccines is sensible. Calling those who question vaccines, anti-vaxxers, which suggests they are uninformed fools, is the kneejerk response of the ignorant and the fanatical.
Blind obedience to any system or authority is unwise and that applies to science-medicine and increasingly in an age when that industry is power and profit-driven and largely devoid not just of ethics but of common sense.
So anybody who is skeptical against a “90% effective” Pfizer vaccine that was developed in MONTHS for a virus with close to 99% survival rate gets labeled “anti-vaxxer”?
Nice try.
My jury is definitely still out on the new Covid-19 vaccines. After all, detailed efficacy data has yet to be presented and we have seen nothing of the safety data. It is to be hoped that the same rigorous approval process can be applied to these new products as has been too other vaccines now in use. I don’t believe that this cautiousness delineates me as an “anti-vaxxer”.
Apparently though, one in three people in France is opposed to this entire class of products. I am astonished! Apparently a large proportion of people wouldn’t get a Covid-19 jab – WHATEVER the safety data says!
Just imagine if a group were vocally opposed to all antiseptics, all anasthetics, all chemotherapy, all therapeutic antibodies or any other class of medical product? How would we regard them? Outside of religious groups, such as the Jehovah’s witnesses, I find this hard to imagine. Is “anti-vaxxers” an apt term for this group? Well if they are opposed to vaccination for its own sake, have some irrational pseudo-scientific claim that we are “over-vaccinated” or that vaccinations are damaging to our immune system, I think the term is good enough. Maybe vaccine denier would do just as well. If they have genuine concerns about a particular product, for example the evidenced rather than imagined number of adverse events for that particular product, perhaps that term is unfair.
“Vaccine sceptics” are, in their beliefs, a heteregenous group. But they do seem to band together.
I have faith in my immune system, it has done me well so far. I have never had flu and when I do rarely get a cold it only ever lasts an evening or 2. I don’t feel the need for vaccines but that doesn’t mean I think no one should have them. Can’t it be an individual choice?
Depends on the vaccine and where you live. I don’t see why you should not be able to choose whether or not you have a flu vaccine. Though if you base your opinion on vaccines as a whole class on what you “feel the need for” this doesn’t sound like informed consent
If there is a disease I felt vulnerable to I would consider it. But when it comes to something like flu or Covid I would rather make use of my own natural defences. When I say ‘feel the need’ I mean having looked in to quite a lot I think I’m better off without. I’m not saying it on a whim or a gut feeling.
For both of those, if you are not old, the advantage is more in preventing spread than one’s own personal protection.
For Covid-19 it is not clear what the parameters will be. To begin with there will be far less vaccine around than people who want to take it. We should review the situation when there begins to be a surplus of it. By that time the advantage of any incremental herd protection should be clearer and also there should be a slightly clearer idea of the residual risk.
Even at this stage, it seems unlikely that anyone (except a few with certain immune system issues) will truly be better off without – from a medical point of view at least.
I read many comments about this article that suggest that the writers are offended by the label “anti-vaxxers”. Strange that many of the same people are upset when LBG… people want to be able to define the labels that apply to them. Let’s be a little bit less sensitive, people!
Surely the article is merely trying to explain why France, a supposed bastion of Cartesian certainty that might be expected to embrace vaccines, is sceptical about them. And it seems that it is for more or less the same reasons as many of the commentariat: 1) we don’t know how safe they are; and 2) the government is in cahoots with the vaccine makers.
A better label, although not as hyperbolic, is vaccine-questioners.
Those who question vaccines range across a broad spectrum from:
A tiny minority who reject all vaccines and probably all conventional medical treatments.
A group of parents who have had children injured or killed by vaccines who are reluctant to give surviving children vaccines.
A large group which is disturbed at the increasingly experimental nature of vaccines, particularly where genetic meddling is involved.
Many who simply believe there are too many vaccines, too soon, too often, too multiple, too experimental given to children today, within hours of birth if not in utero.
Others who believe that immune function and caring for the body to optimise it is a better way to preserve and create health than any pill or needle.
Some say no vaccines ever; some say some vaccines sometimes; some say all vaccines but in my time, when the child is older and never in multiple form.
As with all human situations the people and their positions are diverse so to label everyone an anti-vaxxer, used in a derogatory sense and as a slur, is unwise and unfair.
Vaccine questioners are common while true anti-vaxxers are rare, but, lump them all together and you will soon find more people questioning and more of the questioners becoming hardline on the issue.
“progenitor of the widely-debunked, but far from dead, Hydroxychloroquine craze.”
As soon as I read this I knew that you did not know what you are writing about and went no further. FYI there are over 120 trials supporting the use of hydroxychloroquine provided it is used with zinc as it is a zinc ionophore with zinc blocking the replication of the virus within human cells, though it has other beneficial actions in blocking the activities of Cov-2, including stopping the entry of Cov-2 proteins into the nucleus where they switch off the immune killer T cell response but enhance the release of cytokinese. Ironically the effectiveness of the actions of this drug against SARS-Cov-1 were proved in a 2005 trial funded by Fauci’s NIAID where it was the only product other than Remdesivir that was found to be effective, including candidate vaccines. Since NIAD has a financial interest in Remdesivir at a treatment cost of $1350 per tablet per day compared to HCQ at $10 for 60 tablets both used for five days, you can see why it has not been approved by the FDA.
The so called definitive trials used to trash this cheap, safe and effective product on behalf of the pharmaceutical industry used it at a near toxic dose of 6 times the required one and in the absence of zinc. It is an effective drug against autoimmune reactions that are involved in the fatalities from Covid-19 with long term use of decades for such disorders as Lupus – with such patients showing a low level of infection with Cov-2. For those here with an open mind go to the web site of the Frontline Doctors at americasfrontlinedoctors.com where you will find the trial and use data or look at their videos on BitChute as they have been banned from YouTube for telling the truth. They are a group of prominent US doctors working in leading hospitals whom developed the very effective i+MASK treatment that uses either hydroxycholorquine + zinc or more recently ivermectin, another drug the pharmaceutical are also trying to ban because it is cheap and safe.
A visit to a pre-1960’s cemetery may focus the mind. All those markers for 2-year olds and 5-year olds are not mere ornaments; the remains of little bodies lie beneath.
Those markers indicate the toll taken by poverty and poor living conditions. The records are clear, from 1830 in the UK, wherever living conditions were improved, child mortality rates plummeted. Indeed, the records also show that incidence of infectious diseases had declined and mortality was flatlining, long before vaccines.
Perspective is all. Modern medicine and what has become its vaccine cult, likes to take credit for decline in disease and mortality. But it is undeserved, as doctors were taught and knew, at least until the Seventies.
-On October 19, 1970, Harvard’s Dr. Edward H. Kass gave a speech to the annual meeting of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, of which he was President.
In his famous speech, Dr. Kass took his infectious disease colleagues to task, warning them that drawing false conclusions about WHY mortality rates had declined so much could cause them to focus on the wrong things. As he explained:
“”¦we had accepted some half truths and had stopped searching for the whole truths. The principal half truths were that medical research had stamped out the great killers of the past”Š”tuberculosis, diphtheria, pneumonia, puerperal sepsis, etc.”Š”and that medical research and our superior system of medical care were major factors extending life expectancy, thus providing the American people with the highest level of health available in the world. That these are half truths is known but is perhaps not as well known as it should be.”