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October 8, 2024 - 6:30pm
Elon Musk doubled down on his support for vaccines in a Monday interview with Tucker Carlson.
“I’m not anti-vaccine in general,” the Tesla CEO said. “I think we want to exercise caution with the use of vaccines, but in the absence of vaccines, there’ll be a lot more people that have died.” He cited polio and smallpox vaccines as examples of this success.
However, Musk expressed concern about quality control and vaccine mandates. “That doesn’t mean that vaccines should not have any scrutiny,” he told Carlson. “We should be making sure that the quality control of vaccines is incredibly good, since we’re giving them to children.” Further, he warned that “we shouldn’t force people to take vaccines.”
In 2020, Musk said he would not take the Covid-19 vaccine when it was made available. He later came out in support of the jab, and of vaccines in general. “To be clear, I do support vaccines in general & covid vaccines specifically. The science is unequivocal,” he wrote in 2021. Musk reported in 2021 that he and his children received the Covid-19 vaccine, though two years later he said he was nearly hospitalised as a result of the third dose. He has remained sceptical of vaccine mandates and boosters.
The SpaceX founder has in the past shared criticism of earlier claims that the Covid vaccine was 100% effective. Musk also opposed the executive order forcing employers to require workers to get the vaccine or face fines, a rule he said he would have violated. The order was ultimately struck down in court before enforcement began.
During the interview with Carlson, Musk also discussed his support for Donald Trump and joked that he could go to prison if Kamala Harris wins the US election. He suggested that Democrats use anti-democratic tactics, and that if Trump loses in November the party would manipulate the immigration process to win permanent majorities in swing states. “My prediction is, if there’s another four years of a Dem administration, they will legalise so many illegals that the next election there won’t be any swing states, and this will be a single-party country,” he claimed.
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SubscribeI have no issues with the Covid vaccines. I’m sure they helped millions of elderly people and those with underlying health issues. The problem was forcing young, healthy people to take the vaccines, and the overwhelming misinformation about the effectiveness of the vaccines.
Out of interest JV, and assuming you may be similar age, did you have the BCG/TB jab as kids? We all did. Polio too, although I think that was sugar lump.
Scenario obviously different as there wasn’t a TB or Polio pandemic when I had mine, but then why did we all bother?
Clearly there is a difference but I think it’s much more nuanced than the general anti-vaxxer angle (and I appreciate you aren’t one of those).
Were those vaccines that prevented you from catching smallpox and polio? I am old enough to have had the smallpox vaccine.
‘Scenario obviously different as there wasn’t a TB or Polio pandemic when I had mine, ‘
Why was there a COVID pandemic after a mass COVID vaccination programme?
They are a totally different type of vaccine.
Dr Geert van den Bossche sp? warned of this in 2021. His warnings fell on deaf ears and he was branded a fake and fraud. And so it came to pass.
I got all the childhood vaccines when I was a kid. I’m 59 now. It’s now 2024, and maybe we should have a more sophisticated and nuanced conversation about vaccines. That said, I’m very supportive of vaccines.
Allow me to down my ink pen for a moment.
‘did you have the BCG/TB jab as kids?’
Why is that relevant.
‘, but then why did we all bother?’
So you didn’t catch TB or polio. Why is that relevant.
‘Clearly there is a difference but I think it’s much more nuanced than the general anti-vaxxer angle’
Really. How do you know how nuanced any persons view on mandatory vaccinations was. You would need a long and in depth conversation to understand how ‘nuanced’ their view was. Are you passing judgement on all people that protested mandatory vaccines? Saying that they aren’t capable of nuance? Are only people that had the covid vaccine capable of nuance? People like you? You’re the only one capable of understanding nuance? And the people that questioned it aren’t?
No not passing judgment – more prompting a thought. We trusted back then didn’t we and I don’t recollect anyone ever not wanting those vaccines. What changed? The complexity of mRNA science is not what created the anti-vax lobby as that is beyond the comprehension of most. (And by the way I agree enforced vaccination was wrong). Here we are some years later and billions had a jab – and you know what half the World hasn’t died from vaccine complications.
I think there is a story that will be told about how social media fuels and accelerates conspiracies. And the historical analysis will trace the many malign actors who had an interest in that. That is what is different to when I had my sugar lump.
‘No not passing judgment – more prompting a thought.’
‘ I think it’s much more nuanced than the general anti-vaxxer angle’
Your thought being that the ‘anti vaxxer’ angle is not nuanced. Based on absolutely nothing.
‘We trusted back then didn’t we and I don’t recollect anyone ever not wanting those vaccines. What changed?’
When? What time period? My nan comes from the 1930s and thinks books give you funny ideas. But then access to even a library wasn’t available to her. So yes probably people didnt question things like that as often based on:
– lower standards of education, people left school at 14
– no access to any of the information required to question said vaccines
– no platforms to question such things – the Internet wasn’t invented.
To say people ‘trusted back then’ is a generalised statement based on absolutely nothing, your ‘recollections’ are not facts, I think people in this country have always had a healthy skepticism of government policy, political movements and organisations that reflected that have been about at least as long my nan.
‘? The complexity of mRNA science is not what created the anti-vax lobby as that is beyond the comprehension of most.’ –
Do you understand mrna science? You would need an understanding of it yourself to say that it is beyond everybody else’s comprehension. What are you basing this statement on? Apart from your own assumptions?
.’ Here we are some years later and billions had a jab – and you know what half the World hasn’t died from vaccine complications.’
Nobody said they would. That is hyperbolic nonsense again – what anti vaxxer said that half the world would die from the vaccines?
‘ I think there is a story that will be told about how social media fuels and accelerates conspiracies. And the historical analysis will trace the many malign actors who had an interest in that.’
You are still referring to people that questioned the covid response as’ conspiracy theorists’. Why?
I hope the historical analysis includes a run down of all the normal people, like the Canadian truckers, that stood up against mandatory vaccinations, and were treated in the most disgusting way by their own governments, plenty of people in Britain had the government rammed up their arse for questioning it, are you going to refer to them as ‘malign actors’?
You might find a number of ‘malign actors’ actually frequent the world of big pharma too. I hope they are included in the historical analysis.
Sounds like your analysis has big pharma as the saviour and the stupid proletariat that questioned their drugs as the conspiracy theorists that are incapable of nuance and too stupid to read enough to understand the differences between traditional vaccines and mrna vaccines?
I sincerely hope you aren’t anything to do with the government, your opinion of the British people makes me sick.
I think there is a story that will be told about how social media fuels and accelerates conspiracies.
There is a story being told, about the manipulation and corruption of governments and big pharmaceutical companies. And the abuse of peoples rights, far too many to go into here.
No one in my immediate family took the covid jab. None of my in-laws did; parents and children. None got seriously ill. They and myself didn’t need to understand mRNA science to be doubtful. One of the reasons those I know didn’t take it was because we could not see how it could have been tested properly. That is not conspiracy based. The lack of testing plus the lack of transparency by the government and then the police knocking on peoples doors only confirmed our doubts. These people are not against vaccines but we’re very cautious about what the government tells us then instructs.
And tell me, what checks did you/your parents make when you had the BCG jab or Polio sugar lump? I suspect you did not read the double-blind studies of it’s efficacy.
That’s the point I’m prompting us ponder. We trusted. We saw folks weren’t dropping dead after they’d had it. Why and what, for some, changed?
I think attempt to enforce was always wrong and I would recognise that will have drawn an understandable reaction.
My parents were probably terrified of polio. Every winter the fear grew. They were a different generation with different experiences than us. They took things on trust. I no longer have that trust. I also have access to a lot of information. As far as people dropping dead from the vaccine; no one expected to see people dropping dead. We were concerned about the long term effects.
Why and what, for some, changed?
I thought I’d done that. There was no way they could have tested the vaccine properly. And as it turned out they had not.
There wasn’t an unprecedented global lockdown based on poor science and data due to polio or TB was there.
You aren’t prompting anyone to ‘ponder’ anything.
We saw folks weren’t dropping dead is not an argument. Who are ‘we’. How many ‘folks’ that had the polio vaccine did you have access to?
I’ve already pointed out how access to information has changed so that it is easier for people to question things. That is one of the major changes that has occurred.
Various British political movements have questioned government policy and have done for at least the last hundred years.
Would you like a history book?
While I personally didn’t see anybody die following the mRNA vaccine, I did see plenty of major adverse events which I have never observed in any other vaccine. As an example, a colleague of mine developed hematuria (blood in the urine) after the 1st shot probably due to acute glomerulonephritis, which lasted about a week; could have been coincidence but exactly the same thing happened after the 2nd shot so it’s clear this was due to the vaccine.
Indeed the mRNA vaccines were not properly tested, and the initial trials were dishonest since the number of deaths in the control arm was actually less than in the vaccinated arm (albeit not significantly so). But the most important thing is that no thorough study was done of the pharmacokinetics and pharmacological distribution of the mRNA vaccines. The mRNA was supposed to stay in the deltoid muscle and not last more than a couple of days. Well the mRNA has been found in every organ system in the body (no surprise given that the mRNA was transported in a lipid nanoparticle which can easily penetrate any cell membrane) and has been shown to be present up to 6 months post-vaccination (no surprise again since uridine had been uniformly substituted by pseudomethyluridine which prevents mRNA degradation as well as attack by antibodies. Of course the latter was irrelevant because the mRNA never was exposed to any antibodies given that it was either located within a lipid nanoparticle or a cell. Further, the spike protein was found to be expressed from every organ in the body. No surprise then that there were some major adverse events. e.g. express the spike protein in the heart and guess what, you’re likely to get myocarditis.
Mandatory covid vaccination was completely unethical. This isn’t a nuanced case but a black and white one. At the time the mandate was introduced it was already known that the mRNA (as well as the DNA-based) covid vaccines did not prevent either infection or transmission. In other words they were of absolutely no benefit to 3rd parties. Under these circumstances there is absolutely no moral justification for a mandate.
I’m pretty sure there isn’t a TB vaccine. But there are super strains of TB in America and abroad. These strains are antibiotic resistant. Unfortunately, pharmaceutical companies aren’t making new antibiotics, because they aren’t profitable. Back when I read The Los Angeles Times (paper version!,) they had a couple of articles about people with the super strains, who were “super spreaders,”and were forced to stay in the hospital. My memory isn’t what it used to be, but I think the courts ruled against the patients. I think Jacobson v Massachusetts (1906) was involved. That decision allowed the government to take control when there is a public health emergency. Scary.
I was wrong. There is a vaccine for tb, but I don’t remember getting it.
Admitting you were wrong?
Are you sure that you understand how below-the-line commenting works?
I dont think the TB vaccine is very widespread yet. Its fairly new.
My first wife had an uncle (now long deceased) who had polio as a kid. One of his legs was significantly shorter than the other as a result, and he had to wear a boot with a massive heel and sole throughout his life. If you’d seen that, you’d know why we have polio vaccines.
By the time there’s an epidemic it’s too late. All these diseases are floating around and once the percentage of the population that is vaccinated falls below a threshold (different for each disease but around 90% or more) the disease starts to spread. We’ve seen it with measles after the “MMR jab causes autism” affair.
Incidentally BCG (for TB) is not done in the US.
Also, not evident that the covid vaccines helped anyone. It is hard to see how a vaccine administered by injection can have an impact on mucosal immunity which is what’s needed for COVID, influenza and any influenza-like virus.
Actually there is lots of evidence that they did nothing, or worse than, for every age group.
I initially didn’t have a problem either, but did not get a covid jab because covid was clearly not an illness for me that required it, and there was too much unknown about the jab. I trusted the medical science system I work alongside to figure out problems quickly. But they didn’t, and we are now learning that Covid “vaccines” have a range of problems that are highly unusual for a vaccine, and which outstrip any benefits, for most health people. Try, for example, research in the past few months that shows mRNA booster jabs INCREASE your chance of covid in the 4 months of so after injection. Consequently, I now have a problem with them.
Part of the problem is that it’s hard to know to know the effectiveness of the vaccines. Even now, there’s really no way to know how effective the Covid-19 vaccines were. Just as it’s hard to know how serious their side effects were.
That said, I agree that the vaccines were oversold, and vaccine mandates are never a good idea. I remember Rand Paul making the point that vaccine mandates are wrong way back when he was first seated in the Senate in 2011. He said we should persuade, not force.
I got the Covid-19 vaccine when it first came out, and later one booster. The data seemed sound, and I’ve seen nothing since that makes me regret getting it. My family all got the vaccine as well.
I got double vaxxed. One of my children refused and was fired because of it. Very proud of that kid.
The mRNA injections required that the definition of “vaccine” be changed to accommodate the difference between real vaccines and mRNA injections. The proof is in the death rate increases that have been experienced in the vaccinated nations.
There are TB vaccines. What was received as children was a TB test.
That must vary by country. I got the BCG jab about 50 years ago. “The Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine is a live attenuated vaccine used to prevent tuberculosis (TB) and other mycobacterial infections. It is particularly effective in protecting babies and young children against severe forms of TB, such as TB meningitis.”
I was incredibly surprised when I found that the UK had ceased BCG vaccinations at school. Now TB is on the rise…..
Indeed. I had it as I grew up in the UK. In the US (where I have lived for the past 30 years) the BCG vaccine was never deployed.
Mr. Musk’s stuttering style (understandable, since he is the embodiment of ‘deep pockets’ in a litigious society), was thankfully less distressing to this listener during these discussions.
Listening to his perspectives as a merit-based elite on a wide range of current topics was refreshing. He was often somewhat diplomatic, offering no mention of the blueblood mindset of congenital and incidental elites, but his exposure of the simple math and compelling probabilities leading from bypassed legal immigration, to the elimination of Swing States, to a one-party nation was convincing, and disturbing. Such an outcome in coming years would have the character of a constitutional monarchy or simple oligarchy, possibly resulting in a reformed Constitution focusing on pragmatism (as an idol), and with few guiding principles supported by history.
In retrospect, the enforced Covid vaccine injections became a figurative springboard to bypass national ethics and reshape them to implement ongoing political control. But the relevance of this minor point was only structural to the larger discussion.