Anti-science views of conservatives led to many more COVID deaths

I'm a strong believer in science. Everyone should be. Not just because science is our best means of knowing reality, and that's a very good thing. Also because ignoring science can be dangerous to your health.

Very dangerous, according to Peter Hotez, MD, Ph.D, who wrote a book that I'm about half through reading: The Deadly Rise of Anti-Science: A Scientist's Warning. Hotez is the founding dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, where he co-directs the Texas Children's Center for Vaccine Development.

His book, which I'm enjoying a lot despite the bleak theme, describes in persuasive detail how resistance to COVID-19 vaccines in the United States, mostly by conservatives, caused a massive amount of unnecessary deaths among people in red states.

(Note to readers in other countries: for an originally arbitrary reason, red came to be associated with conservative/Republican areas in the United States and blue with liberal/Democratic areas. Thankfully, I live in a blue state, Oregon.)

As you can read below in excerpts from Hotez' book that I've shared, there's solid evidence to support the conclusion that the United States suffered about 200,000 unnecessary COVID deaths due to vaccine resistance, chiefly in states that voted for Donald Trump in 2020. 

That's an astounding number. The 9/11 attack in my country killed about 3,000 people. That led to a major war against terror, as our politicians termed it. The recent attack by Hamas has killed about 1,400 Israelis so far. That caused Israel to declare war against Hamas.

Yet 200,000 unnecessary COVID deaths in the United States hasn't caused a massive war against anti-science, though it should. All we have to date are skirmishes by science-admiring people like Hotez and other devotees of facts rather than falsehoods.

Here's how Hotez describes the relation between conservative states and increased deaths from COVID-19.

In stark terms, the idea of "red COVID" points out that as the United States entered the last half of 2021, each blue, liberal state with a Democratic majority that had voted for Joe Biden in the 2020 election had achieved far higher vaccination rates than conservative, red states that had voted for Donald Trump. 

Leonhardt states plainly: "The political divide over vaccinations is so large that almost every reliably blue state now has a higher vaccination rate than almost every reliably red state."

Given the high rate of protection that vaccines confer against hospitalization and deaths, especially versus the original lineage of the virus and its Alpha and Delta variants, those low vaccination rates correlated with high death rates.

Therefore, it was no surprise (although still upsetting) that COVID-19 deaths also demonstrated a similar pattern of partisan split. Importantly, the differences in vaccination rates represent much more than an abstract concept; they directly translate into a partisan division in terms of lives lost.

By the summer and fall of 2021, as the highly transmissible Delta variant became dominant, overwhelmingly those losing their lives from COVID-19 were living in conservative counties with a majority that voted for Trump in 2020.

Here's an informative figure from Axios that illustrates the point Hotez makes in his book: living in a red state was bad for your health in the time of COVID.

Here's how Hotez describes the basis for a conclusion that 200,000 deaths could have been prevented if vaccination rates were as high in red areas of the country as in blue areas.

The estimate of 200,000 deaths is calculated by counting the 245,000 cumulative COVID-19 deaths in the United States between May 1 and December 31,2021, according to the University of Washington - Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation's "COVID-19 Projections," multiplied by a factor of 0.80.

The 0.80 number reflects the percentage of deaths constituted by unvaccinated Americans at the peak of the Delta wave in August 2021 (81%) and September 2021 (79%) according to a Peterson - KFF analysis of CDC information to account for 196,000 lives lost.

The CDC estimates a ratio of 16.3 to 1 of unvaccinated to fully vaccinated deaths during the period of Delta predominance (July to November 2021), equivalent to 230,000 deaths.

Another approximation reflects the percentage of deaths made up by the unvaccinated (85%) versus those partially or completely vaccinated for the state of Texas for the year 2021 according to the Department of Texas State Health Services, which works out to 208,000 lives lost.

The health analyst Charles Gaba estimates between 180,000 and 235,000 deaths. Peterson - KFF also provides an additional (and somewhat lower) estimate of 162,000. This lower estimate is based on the 91% effectiveness versus death caused by the Delta variant for the two mRNA COVID-19 vaccines, therefore even if all of the unvaccinated had accepted their vaccines, there would still be some deaths.

Peterson - KFF also find that vaccines would have prevented 234,000 deaths if we include the first three months of 2022.

Comments

[Ron E.]

“Anti-science views of conservatives led to many more COVID deaths.” (Sounds like a good read but also an invitation for ever growing conspiracy theorists).

How sad, seeing as killer diseases such as polio, smallpox, measles, rubella, diphtheria and yellow fever have been eradicated in the U.S. due to vaccination programmes while several others are almost eradicated. Very similar in the U.K.

The vaccination uptake has slowed recently, mainly due to anti-vaccine misinformation notions. Apparently, such conspiracy information is often spread by the algorithms on social media which prioritize the content that users see in their feeds. So, the more we access an is-sue the more it can lead to distorted and misleading fiction.

Sadly, misinformation seems to have become the hallmark of our societies, not only amongst the populace but (and perhaps it always has been) now widespread with world leaders – as recent events in both America and the U.K. show.

Honesty and reliability are rare amongst political leaders. I don’t know the antidote, perhaps there isn’t one. Religion and other such organisations also have political (doctrines) so who’s to trust? Yes, science tries to keep its head above such waters but even science is becoming more of a political tool.

[um]

@ Ron E.

Until recently our history, as nation, people, group and individual was presented to us in terms of ... as we say here ...nothing but good things about the dead.

We spoke of how people that came from Europe and spread all over the world brought wealth to Europe but we never spoke of .. at what cost for whom

In many of our European cities statues are to be found in honor of rulers, military elite etc Streets and squares are named after them.

But now due to the internet and the globalization the establishment is no longer able to prevent that besides the "good" also "the bad" is pointed out ...me too is a movement not alone restricted to the abuse of women, but just ONE expression of a greater movement to brink in the publish what went wrong in the past.

So it should not surprise people that this led to the establishment of the conviction within the minds and hearts of certaqin people that the establishment, not only the political but also the scientific establishment, cannot and should not be trusted.

It will take some time that people will be able again to trust the establishment. That is only possible if they can show that they as elite are only there to serve mankind and not their own interests

[Sant64]

Covid was the biggest hoax ever foisted upon the world.

The proof of that? Covid is still here, and Covid is as deadly as ever. Right?

And yet, no more lockdowns. No more mask mandates. No more social distancing. No more hysteria about getting vaccinated. No more hyperbolic rhetoric about following directions or you're killing grandma.

What a horrible, tragic hoax. A hoax that not only needlessly cost us 2 years of our lives, but irreparably damaged millions of children by setting back their education and social development.

A hoax that was exploited by the current clueless poobahs to severely damage the economy, resulting in spiraling inflation. Trillions of dollars down the drain.

I know of no one who died from covid. I don't even know a single person who knows a single person who died of Covid.

It was all a hoax. The vaccine was a hoax too. So glad I never got jabbed.

[7]

TY. Sant64

ALBERTA
Not very far from U
Danielle Smith,premier of Alberta, apologises for Human Rights crimes against those who chose not to have a vaccine and stood against lockdowns.https://twitter.com/search?q=alberta%20we%20were%20wrong&src=typed_query

[La Madrugada]

Ask your Doctor if a drug (it is not a vaccine) with 32 pages of side effects is right for you!

[um]

@ La Madrugada

please do post a link to these 32 pages.

[La Madrugada]

@Um
Please have a look on Youtube:
Titel:
Long list of side effects to look out for
By Dr. John Campbell

La Madrugada (nurse)

[um]

@ Madrugada

Thank you but I am not interested in the discourses of Dr. Campbell discrediting what others had to say.

I an only interested in the 32 pages document with side effects you refered to.

[12 months left]

Yes, I agree with your assessment and think everyone should be forced to be vaccinated or lose their job, place in University, and not be allowed into any business if:

If we didn’t have a constitution.
If we didn’t have the Nuremberg convention.
If no one sick developed immunity.
If there was no corruption.
If no one tried to hide the data for 75 years.
If it was an actual vaccine and not a treatment.
If there were no lipid nanoparticles.
If there was no such thing as Vitamin D.
If there were 10 years of safety data.
If the drug company employees actually took it themselves.
If Bill Gates was not involved.
If there was free open debate.
If Hank Aaron had not died right after getting it.
If tyranny wasn’t a consideration.
If medical passports were not under consideration.
If we all agree to have health experts decide our health decisions.

But I do have one question: If the vaccine works for you, why did you need others to take it?

[um]

@ 12 months

Do you lay down same kind of conditions when you take a plane or even step out of your door, buy a loaf of bread etc etc etc?
If not its just selective abomination.

[um]

@ 12 month

everybody and everywhere and on all levels, plans have to be made for things to continue, from a house hold to the organisation of the state.

Yes, that is done by humans according their liking, understanding and capacity.

Yes that can be done with selfish intend, t has been done in the past that way and it will be done. that way in the future.

Nothing new .. and no need of any global conspiracy theoiry

[JET]

Given what we now know about the COVID injections, I am very surprised Brian, that you have not provided some kind of retraction to your posts on this topic.

[Brian Hines]

JET, you're misinformed. Covid shots are highly effective. Everyone should continue getting them. I'm going to get a booster next month. Don't spread false information. Lives are at stake.

[sant64]

I'll never get a covid shot. Not worried in the least about covid, though I won't forget the 2 years of my life stolen by the Orwellian lockdown that accomplished nothing.

In related goose chase news, I've located Keith S. He's in Bend now. You probably' still haven't spoken to him, but I'm sure he appreciates your crusade to save his job.
https://www.instagram.com/olymtbiker/