As we approach the end of the year, we are repeating the twenty most-read articles of 2023, in reverse order. This is number 16 and it was first published on June 8.
INCH by agonising inch, we move closer to the denouement of the ‘safe and effective’ Covid vaccine tragedy.
It is agonising for doctors who believed the jab would help protect patients against serious illness; for people harmed and bereaved by the jabs, and for researchers who have been telling us for more than two years (see here, for example) that vaccines based on preparing the body to deal with SARS-CoV-2’s toxic ‘spike’ protein might cause the same type of damage as the virus itself.
Now, in a comprehensive nationwide South Korean study, an expert committee has confirmed 480 cases of vaccine-related heart inflammation (myocarditis), including 21 deaths, 12 of which were in young adults. Ninety-five of the 480 cases were classified as severe, most needing intensive care in hospital and one receiving a heart transplant.
The analysis may be the most comprehensive to date from anywhere in the world. The committee included seven cardiologists, helped by investigators in 16 regional centres who provided data from medical records. Physicians and health care staff were put under a legal obligation to report suspected adverse events from the jab.
Stringent criteria were adopted before concluding that the vaccine was to blame, possibly causing many likely cases to be excluded. The 480 confirmed cases were among 1,533 cases reported in which acute myocarditis was suspected.
Reporting their findings in the European Heart Journal, the researchers say that in comparison to the 44million people vaccinated during the study period (26 February to 31 December 2021) myocarditis attributable to the vaccine is rare. It was highest in young men, aged between 12 and 17 (5.29 cases per 100,000 vaccinated people) and lowest in women over 70 (0.22 per 100,000).
They express particular concern, however, that eight of the 21 deaths were initially classified as sudden cardiac death, unrelated to the vaccine, and came to light only as the result of post-mortem examination.
‘Sudden cardiac death (SCD) was the most serious and worrisome adverse reaction of Covid-19 vaccination in our study,’ they write. In those eight cases, despite death within a week of vaccination, ‘VRM (vaccine-related myocarditis) was not suspected as a clinical diagnosis or a cause of death before performing an autopsy.’
All eight were aged under 45, and all received the mRNA vaccines, with vaccine-related myocarditis deemed by the investigators to be ‘the only possible cause of death’.
This finding, they say, ‘warrants the careful monitoring or warning of SCD as a potentially fatal complication of Covid-19 vaccination’, especially in individuals aged under 45.
Elderly people may also be at risk, but less likely to be diagnosed as victims of the jab because of pre-existing heart disease.
In a blog posting last month (May 22), the American cardiologist and Covid vaccine critic Dr Peter McCullough commented on the case of an 81-year-old man who collapsed within a day of his fifth mRNA shot, and was in hospital for more than a month, including a period on full life support. The case shows that in the elderly ‘any degree of cardiovascular injury could be disastrous’, he wrote. ‘The Covid-19 vaccines do not stop SARS-CoV-2 infection, transmission, nor do they reduce the severity of disease or prevent hospitalisation or death. For that reason, the risks of heart damage, blood clots, and other cardiovascular events far outweigh the benefits . . .
‘I wonder how many elderly patients have died within a few days of the Covid-19 vaccine, unrecognised and not reported by families, doctors, or others. Only all-cause mortality data published in the coming months will give us a clue. In the meantime, all seniors should understand that even if prior shots were tolerated, the next one could be fatal.’
Many countries, including the UK, are already experiencing a sharp increase in excess deaths in all age groups – deaths occurring at a rate higher than over the previous five-year average, and not caused by Covid.
Dr John Campbell, a retired nurse teacher whose YouTube videos on Covid matters have coolly educated millions, recently likened a 4,190 excess deaths figure recorded in the last two weeks of April in the UK to the death toll from a terrorist attack. Significant increases are being seen in deaths from heart failure and strokes.
Mourning the lack of interest in mainstream media in this ‘underreported global phenomenon’, Campbell commented: ‘The BBC, for example, seems to be saying essentially nothing about this. This is a cause for concern in itself.’
Meanwhile, the NHS is continuing to emphasise the safety of the jab, telling patients: ‘There have been rare cases of inflammation of the heart (myocarditis) reported after Covid-19 vaccination. Most people who had this recovered following rest and simple treatments.’
NHS England says that 3.6 million people – more than half those eligible – have had their ‘spring booster’, and urges the rest to have their jab at one of 2,500 sites across England before a June 30 deadline.
In another blog post yesterday McCullough writes: ‘We have never had an adult vaccine that required two shots as a primary series and then continual injections every six months with no end in sight. Even the most compliant patients are asking their doctors and family members when this is going to end?’