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Comment by throwawaymedia | Hacker News Reader

If you open up the actual VAERS (https://vaers.hhs.gov/data.html), you'll see disclaimers like this:

> Reports may include incomplete, inaccurate, coincidental and unverified information.

> The number of reports alone cannot be interpreted or used to reach conclusions about the existence, severity, frequency, or rates of problems associated with vaccines.

The numbers are suddenly high, in part, because of this:

https://vaers.hhs.gov/faq.html

> Healthcare providers are required to report to VAERS the following adverse events after COVID-19 vaccination [under Emergency Use Authorization (EUA)], and other adverse events if later revised by CDC...

There's a COVID-specific reporting requirement on a previously optional system.

Agreed. The reports that VAERS provides can hint at rare adverse outcomes for vaccines, but it simply doesn't hold any significance compared to clinical trials. Comparing them is just outright false equivalence.

VAERS is a great thing, but it's deeply unfortunate that antivax conspiracy theorists have used it to spread lies like yours.

https://www.science.org/content/article/antivaccine-activist...

There is no conspiracy theory here. Stop using that term to minimize the importance of things. VAERS is a data point. Check out similar data points from other countries. Numbers DO match.

What other data points? Can you provide peer reviewed high quality data to support your claims? Just because you want a conspiracy theory to be true does not make it so.

Can _you_ provide any other legitimate data point that tracks adverse vaccine reactions? Most likely not. Because the narrative is such that if there is anything negative comes out, people are immediately being canceled or fired.

Please don't misrepresent VAERS.

"Due to the program's open and accessible design and its allowance of unverified reports, incomplete VAERS data is often used in false claims regarding vaccine safety."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaccine_Adverse_Event_Reportin...

VAERS is an unvetted database of adverse events that occur some time after a vaccine has been given. It does not mean that there is a causal link.

"CDC cautions that it is generally not possible to find out from VAERS data if a vaccine caused the adverse event, or how common the event might be.[5]"

Particularly, in the current pandemic, we vaccinated a LOT of sick and elderly patients, and we vaccinated them first, in almost unprecedented numbers. So VAERS will have a LOT of "adverse events", simply because the sick and elderly have a lot of these adverse events, vaccine or not.

VAERS hasn't turned up anything like you're implying about the Pfizer vaccine.

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