To Question is Normal
I don't usually get involved in stuff like this. Hell, I rarely even watch the news, so when independent members of my immediate family started talking about a coronavirus back in early 2020, I had to go and google what on earth they were on about.
I'm also usually a big proponent of not unfollowing, blocking or removing people from my social media accounts that share differing political, ideological or other views - I don't want to live in an echo chamber. In fact, quite often, I write to these people seeking explanation of their opinion. Not to argue with them, but rather just to understand their point of view.
However, I must say, I'm getting to the point where I have had enough. It's getting harder and harder to watch/read stories and posts from my friends and acquaintances either denying the legitimacy of Covid-19 or questioning the safety and efficacy of the Covid-vaccines. Now before you get any big ideas about me being a sheep that just blindly follows governmental advice, let's get a few things straight...
I myself have questioned Covid-19 and the vaccines.
I have been in doubt about whether I should get vaccinated, especially given my current state.
I have constantly criticised the management of the pandemic, both where I live and back in Australia.
It's healthy to question. It's normal to have doubts. It's only human to want to weigh up the risks and benefits and make your own decision about what is right for you. But please, consider carefully where, how and who you share those doubts with and where you choose to get advice from.
For the record, I am a scientist. I have now spent over a decade of my life learning to read, understand and produce scientific articles. When I start questioning medical advice or novel treatment strategies, I don't do it by opening Instagram or Google - I go to PubMed (an index of medical science literature). I trawl through articles to find those that address the topic and critically appraise their methods and results. I read and read until I feel I have either sufficient information to make a decision or sufficient confusion to seek a more qualified expert's advice.
This is just my approach - it doesn't make me qualified to make an informed opinion on every topic, and it certainly doesn't give me the right to offer medical advice to others - but it does make me more adept at wading through the world of misinformation and reaching my own conclusion. Unfortunately, most people do not have the access nor the scientific vocabulary to make sense of the majority of scientific literature.
So what can the average person do?
Well, research methods aside, the main thing the past decade has taught me, is that it is simply impossible to be objective. No-one is ever just presenting the facts (me included). There is always a story to be told. That is just as true on all sides of a debate, and we would do well to remember that when reading things that align with our own viewpoints just as much as when reading things that don't.
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The Scientific Process
To be honest, what being a scientist has really done to me of late is made me terrified by today's rhetoric. I constantly see people writing phrases like, "I'm not anti-vax, I'm just pro-choice", or "questioning has become taboo", or "if this [virus/vaccine] was real/safe/effective, it wouldn't need censorship/marketing". There seems to be this wild implication of a grandmaster sitting somewhere manipulating the data, trying to force an agenda and silencing anyone that questions it. But rest assured, that's not how science works.
Science is literally the process of asking and trying to answer questions. But it takes time, and as mentioned above, it's also usually communicated in a highly complicated manner, often not accessible to or understandable by the general population, and at it's core, it is based on gathering evidence to support or refute a hypothesis which will almost never result in a yes or no answer. That's also why every time you hear a reputable scientist talking, they will speak in terms of probability and always with some level of uncertainty.
The problem is, it is so much easier and potentially so much more damaging to share things on social media. Let's take a quick look at the process of publication:
Social media: Someone writes a post - they publish it - people share it. Time needed: < 5 minutes.
Popular media: Someone writes a story - an editor may read and correct it - it is published - people share it. Time needed: 30 minutes.
Reputable News outlets: One journalist writes a story - ideally they verify it with 1-2 sources who have an informed OR controversial opinion on the topic - an editor reads and corrects the story - it is published - people share it. Time needed: 1-2 hours.
Scientific literature: One scientist or more commonly several scientists come up with an idea/hypothesis - they obtain funding to run a study - they obtain necessary approvals from an ethical committee +/- regulatory authority - they conduct the study (recruit participants, test them, give them an intervention or placebo, test again, meticulously record adverse events) - they analyse the data - they write an article - the other author/s help revise the article - they submit to a journal - an editor decides if the article is worthy of review - 2-4 experts in the field scrutinise the quality of the article and provide criticisms to the author/s - the author/s revise based on these comments (which may include rewriting sections of the manuscript, providing more information, collecting more data or reanalysing it) - the experts review the changes and request more if needed - the author/s revise until consensus with the expert reviewers and editors is achieved - the article is published - if lucky, someone shares it, but the full article may be locked behind a publisher's paywall. Time needed: 6 months - 10 years or longer depending on the follow up period.
And that's not mentioning reach. Social media can reach millions of people in minutes, scientific literature is lucky if it reaches hundreds of people in decades. It is just impossible for scientist's to keep up. It's impossible for rational thought to keep up.
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A Matter of Public Health
If you're still with me, there's one more point I'd like to make - and that is, that public health is not about you.
I currently live in Denmark. Here, the prevailing attitude since the beginning of the pandemic has been that the public good is of greater importance than individual freedom. The first speech that the Danish Prime Minister made addressing the pandemic focussed a lot on "samfundssind" or "community mindedness" - something I believe is essential for dealing with public health crises, like a global pandemic.
That means that, yes, you as an individual will need to make some sacrifices. Maybe you have to wear a mask, work from home for a while, wash your hands more frequently, meet up with fewer friends, get vaccinated, etc. But these behaviours benefit society as a whole, so they are a small price to pay for our survival as a community, country, continent, species...
Public health strategies are always about minimising risk/cost and maximising benefits for society as a whole, not for you as an individual.
The most frustrating thing for someone making these public health recommendations, is that if they are effective, they are incredibly difficult to take credit for. You never know who didn't die because they stayed at home or got vaccinated. You never see how many people weren't hospitalised because their relatives and friends washed their hands and wore a mask.
However, the media makes sure that you do see those that have an adverse reaction to a new treatment or vaccine. And seeing is believing. Having a face to attach to the risk makes it real. It makes it feel like it happens more often than it does... and when you're in Australia (a place that, by the way, is geographically and culturally brilliant for coping well with a pandemic due to low population density among other things), and you've been fortunate enough not to have so many faces to attach to the risk of dying from covid itself, then this vaccine seems like an imminent threat to your health without clear benefit.
I get it. But stop. Take it from someone who does not have a single friend in this country that doesn't have a relative or friend who has had Covid-19. The vaccine is not the enemy here. The vaccine is an integral part of the solution. If you're in doubt, go and talk to a doctor or medical scientist with expertise on the topic. If you don't want to get it, then fine, it is still your choice. But then accept that your choice has consequences and comes with a responsibility to the people around you.
I'm always open to debate, so drop me a line if you want to chat.
Over and out.
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