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Comment by daenz | Hacker News Reader

Why do you think they haven't considered the possibility?

Because if the possibility turned out to be true, it would be extremely damaging at a social and political level. Not just on institutions, but on the psyche of people in general. I think everyone understands this at least on a subconscious level. There must not be any truth to it, because if there was, it would do too much damage.

So why would I want people to discuss something that could potentially have that kind of impact? Because I want people to face all of the possible consequences for their choices, not just pick and choose which ones they will consider and acknowledge.

This is teetering on the edge of conspiracy theory. People are and have been researching this possibility and so far haven't found anything big worth reporting. Just because there is no big news doesn't mean people are hiding it.

Remember when simply considering certain possibilities was condemned as proposing conspiracy theories?

"The Lancet letter (also referred to as Calisher et al. 2020) was a statement made in support of scientists and medical professionals in China fighting the outbreak of COVID-19, and condemning theories suggesting that the virus does not have a natural origin, which it referred to as "conspiracy theories".[1][2] The letter was published in The Lancet on February 19, 2020, and signed by 27 prominent scientists, gaining a further 20,000 signatures in a Change.org petition.[3][4] The letter generated significant controversy over the alleged conflicts of interest of its authors, and the chilling effect it had on scientists proposing that the COVID-19 lab leak theory be investigated."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lancet_letter_(COVID-19)

What concrete evidence do you have that any covering-up is actually happening? Unsubstantiated cui bono? reasoning is nothing but conspiracy theory.

That's circular reasoning at best and conspiracy thinking at worst.

They don't want to consider the possibility of X -> if they're wrong about X it would be harmful.

Where's the cycle?

In your assumption that they don't want to consider that possibility. You take your own projection as a given and then continue to argue as though it is true.

1) That's not what circular logic is. Circular logic would be if I said "they don't want to consider it because it's harmful and it's harmful because they don't want to consider it."

2) You asked me why I thought people don't want to consider that possibility, so it's pretty dishonest to now say the premise on which my opinion is based has no basis. If you were arguing in good faith, that's what you would have started with, eg: "People aren't avoiding it" not "Why do you think they are avoiding it."

From the article:

'“We are beginning to see the deaths that result from delay and deferment of treatment for other conditions, like cancer and heart disease, and from those associated with poverty and deprivation.

'“These come through more slowly – if cancer is not treated promptly, patients don't die immediately but do die in greater numbers more quickly than would otherwise be the case.”

'The Government has admitted that the majority of the excess deaths appear to be from circulatory issues and diabetes – long-term, chronic conditions that can be fatal without adequate care.'

These deaths are attributable to specific causes - chronic conditions not receiving proper ongoing care - which have nothing to do with the vaccines. Hell, vaccines /should/ be increasing the amount of ongoing treatment for these conditions, and helping people get back to regular checkups and the associated preventative / early-stage treatment. (noting of course that the current excess deaths are an extremely laggy indicator. the 'vaccines help' hypothesis should then be apparent in a year or two as the excess deaths come back down.)

Yes, the article does a fantastic job of claiming their hypotheses as the only possibilities, while dishonestly ignoring others that would more severely undermine confidence in the state.

I'm honestly surprised they're attributing deaths to lockdowns at all! That's a huge shift in the overton window. If you remember, that was also taboo. But I assume now it's ok to talk about because it can be framed in the louder, "not enough funding for healthcare" context.

It sounds like you really want it to be vaccines even though not much seems to be pointing towards that conclusion, be careful to avoid a bias. The article mentions cancer and cardiovascular chronic diseases.

It doesn't though. It sounds like he wants the possibility acknowledged, and maybe even - gasp - explored.

You're demonstrating an aspect of the social resistance he's talking about.

Of course it's a possibility, and it has received an enormous amount of scrutiny, before and after approval, in many independent countries. The safety of the vaccines is the most obvious thing to be on the lookout for. But just because some people don't like the vaccine doesn't make it more likely to be the cause of excess deaths. Have you considered that fixating on the vaccine could be blinding people to a whole bunch of other potential problems?

I'll bite. What is the mechanism by which the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID vaccine could harm peoples health months or years down the line?

There is a theory that the mRNA sequences could have been reverse transcribed into the DNA of various organs, including liver cells.

https://www.mdpi.com/1467-3045/44/3/73/htm is a in vitro (but not in vivo) demonstration of one element of this theory.

To add to this, there has been evidence that the spike proteins created by the mRNA sequences stay around in the body longer than expected. CDC has now implicitly admitted this.

CDC snapshot July 22: https://web.archive.org/web/20220722141942/https://www.cdc.g...

CDC snapshot July 23: https://web.archive.org/web/20220723161304/https://www.cdc.g...

Notice the change to the "Facts About mRNA COVID-19 Vaccines" section.

This seems like huge news. Why isnt the MSM reporting this?!

Why would they? It just undermines peoples confidence in the institution, with no gain. That's the lens that these kinds of things are looked at through. Better to just quietly alter the messaging.

Just for an example, acute organ damage doesn’t necessarily present symptoms immediately. I knew a kid who had a viral heart infection in his teens that severely damaged it. He recovered in the sense that he could mostly live normally, but his doctor told him he’d be lucky to live past 50.

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