Vaccine Disinformation, Fact-Check Fiesta, and What to Know About Russia Sanctions
Threats, Facts, and Reads #4.17.21
Covid Updates
Kids and Covid
A study looked at Covid in children and found that 2,430 (11.7%) of the 20,714 children who had an emergency department or inpatient encounter were hospitalized with COVID-19.
Males had a higher risk of serious illness which is also true for adult males.
Around 1-2 in 10 child Covid cases were hospitalized, with 1/3 of hospitalized cases having severe Covid,1 meaning they struggled to get enough oxygen and needed intensive care.
Younger children (2-11) may be more likely than older children (12-18) to have severe Covid, but it’s unclear if younger children truly have more cases or if they’re being admitted to an ICU out of an abundance of caution.
Until we know, it’s important that we not assume that caution is the reason for the higher number of admissions.
Non-Hispanic Black and Hispanic or Latino children with COVID-19 were overrepresented but they found no link between severe disease and race/ethnicity among hospitalized patients, checking for other factors influencing the finding.
Put another way, it looks like inequity has more to do with their overrepresentation than does some genetic vulnerability.
Related Read:
No vaccination for children right now makes this a problematic situation.
A 3rd dose may be needed for Covid mRNA vaccines
People will likely need to get a third dose of the company’s SARS-CoV-2 vaccine within 12 months of completing their vaccinations, but it’s not certain just yet.
Flu vaccines are needed yearly because RNA viruses, a category in which both viruses fall, mutate quickly.
This is not always the case, but the more a virus spreads, the more “rolls of the dice” we give it to mutate in a way that outsmarts our vaccines.
Contrary to claims, the reason for repeating doses is that, much like us, immune systems better remember a lesson if it’s repeated.
How Epidemiologists Are Planning to Vacation With Their Unvaccinated Kids
The pandemic has made it tough for families to figure out safe travel options. So we asked some experts what they’re doing this summer.
Laminating your vaccination card? That won’t be necessary
It’s understandable that once you get your COVID-19 vaccination card, you’d want to come up with ways to preserve it. On the other hand, you may have also started hearing warnings from people who say laminating your card will prevent you from being able to mark any booster shots you might need in the future. In short, worrying about preserving your card probably just isn’t necessary.
Concerns about COVID-19 vaccines and menstruation circulate
Concerns about whether COVID-19 vaccines impact menstruation have been spreading online. A trending article shared on social media reviews anecdotal claims that getting vaccinated has made some women’s periods worse. While experts say this appears unlikely, at present there appears to be a shortage of available research examining linkages between women, menstruation, and COVID-19 vaccination.
Given widespread attention on blood clots forming in six women who received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, this concern coupled with this article is expected to exacerbate anti-vaccine advocate’s claims that all COVID-19 vaccines are “experimental” and inherently harmful to women.
The vaccines are not experimental.
They are EUA because that got them to market the fastest. Incidentally, do you know what is experimental? Getting infected with Covid-19. Many viruses have consequences far longer than the initial infection period, with some causing cancer, resurfacing like chickenpox and shingles, and many viruses cause long-term exhaustive syndromes.
J & J Vaccine and Blood Clotting
On April 14, the US CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) met to discuss data on blood clotting reactions in people who got the Johnson and Johnson vaccine.
Reportedly, ACIP plans a follow-up in the next 7-10 days to avoid unnecessary delays in resuming the vaccine’s use.
Some of the ACIP members acknowledged that continuing or extending the pause could have negative downstream effects on vaccination efforts, both in the US and around the world.
That should not be taken to mean they would rush the discussion, but it is a fair statement.
We will update you as the ACIP meetings develop. Based on the available evidence, we have and continue to recommend the mRNA vaccine.
How Are Vaccines Faring Against Variants?
Public health experts have largely offered up reassurance that existing COVID-19 vaccines work well against dominant variants, as NPR reported Friday. However, a small real-world study by Israel's Tel Aviv University, released Saturday, suggests that the B.1.351 variant first discovered in South Africa may be able to evade the Pfizer vaccine, Reuters reports.
There were 8X as many cases involving the variant among 400 patients who’d received 2 doses of the Pfizer vaccine 14+ days before compared to 400 unvaccinated patients.
Caveat: This small preprint study only included those who’d already tested positive for COVID-19; also, the South Africa strain is far from dominant in Israel.
‘Breakthrough Infections’
In the US, a small fraction of the 66 million fully-vaccinated Americans have experienced “breakthrough infections;” some have required hospitalization, The Washington Post reports.
These infections—which likely number in the thousands—are extremely rare but are being closely watched by officials.
The most likely reason: Top officials say individual patients probably mounted a weak immune response to the vaccine—noting that fully vaccinated individuals who died were older people who likely had underlying conditions. It’s rare for breakthrough infections to result in severe illness.
But: While there’s no conclusive evidence that variants are driving breakthrough infections, major gaps in US virus sequencing data make it impossible to identify the strain behind every case.
Reminder: Some breakthrough cases are to be expected, says NIH chief Francis S. Collins. “These are still vaccines that are fantastically safe and effective. But 95 percent is not 100 percent.”
Ending the pandemic and combating vaccine resistance: Modern questions with a long history
Historians of medicine Jeremy Greene and Graham Mooney discuss the coronavirus pandemic through the lens of history with the 'Public Health On Call' podcast.
Threats
Truth-Squadding Russia’s Response to New U.S. Sanctions
From Polygraph
Top Russian government officials, lawmakers, finance, and technology experts have portrayed U.S. sanctions unveiled this week as “meaningless,” “far-fetched” and “absolutely unprovoked.”
It's a great spin, but also false.
On April 15, the U.S. Treasury Department announced a new round of Russian sanctions. These latest measures aim to punish Russia for hacking into U.S. computers, interfering in U.S. elections, threatening Ukraine, and purportedly paying bounties to kill U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
Apart from targeting 16 Russian finance, technology, and intelligence entities and 16 individuals, the White House also granted the Treasury Department “sweeping authority” to respond to “aggressive and harmful activities by the Government of the Russian Federation.”
The sanctions, among other things, forbid U.S. financial institutions from lending to Russian state banks and ban commerce with a half-dozen Russian tech firms that work with Russian intelligence agencies.
U.S. authorities blame Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service, or SVR, for last year’s SolarWinds cyber intrusion, which penetrated nine U.S. government agencies and 100 private firms.
SouthFront is an online disinformation site registered in Russia that receives taskings from the FSB. NewsFront is a Crimea-based disinformation and propaganda outlet that worked with FSB officers to coordinate a narrative that undermined the credibility of a news website advocating for human rights.
The Strategic Culture Foundation (SCF) is an online journal registered in Russia that is directed by the SVR and closely affiliated with the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The GRU operates InfoRos. InfoRos calls itself a news agency but is primarily run by the GRU’s 72nd Main Intelligence Information Center (GRITs). These are far from the only outlets.2
The provisions restrict Russia’s ability to trade in foreign currency, potentially diminishing the value of the ruble. These measures will come into effect on June 14.
Foreign investments started shrinking as soon as the reports appeared in the U.S. media suggesting the sanctions were coming.
By the end of last week, RBC reported, “the share of foreign investments in Russian federal loan bonds fell below 20% for the first time since August 2015.”
US Treasury Provides Missing Link: Manafort’s Partner Gave Campaign Polling Data to Kremlin in 2016
The U.S. Treasury Department said Konstantin Kilimnik, an associate and ex-employee of Paul Manafort, “provided the Russian Intelligence Services with sensitive information on polling and campaign strategy,” during the 2016 election, an apparently definitive statement that neither Special Counsel Robert Mueller nor the Senate Intelligence Committee investigation made in their final reports.
The evidence strongly supports this claim including travel records, emails, personal confessions, and witness testimony.
pg 76 of the Rubio Report All of this comes as no surprise to anyone who read the investigation reports because Rick Gates and Paul Manafort both met with Konstantin Kilimnik on Aug 2, 2016. Manafort went to the meeting after a meeting hours earlier with Trump and Giuliani at Trump tower.
pg 61 of the Rubio Report A bipartisan report that totaled 966 pages dubbed the Rubio Report was the last installation in the series of five documents published in Aug 2020.
“This is new public information that connects the provision of internal Trump campaign data to Russian intelligence.”
—Andrew Weissmann, who led the prosecution of Manafort for the Special Counsel, told Just Security on Thursday.
See footnotes for the previous reports3
Flooding through central financial hubs like New York and London, illicit financial flows fuel authoritarian repression, destabilize weak states, launder drug money, and fund terrorism.
President Joe Biden’s Interim National Security Strategic Guidancerecognizes that corruption is “increasingly weaponized by authoritarian states to undermine democratic institutions,” but it does not provide guidance on how the administration intends to address the problem.
The authors of the next National Security Strategy must ask how U.S. national security agencies fit in the anti-corruption landscape.
To inform the development of a comprehensive strategy to address corruption, they should consider how the use of foreign policy tools by national security and foreign policy agencies, from seemingly benign foreign assistance to tactical foreign subversion, interact with and potentially amplify the very challenges they seek to remedy.
Russia now requires all smart devices to have Russian software pre-installed.
The order extends to phones, computers, and TVs. The Russians say this is intended to help Russian software companies compete with international companies.
If you believe that is the sole reason, we have a rural Russian hotel to sell you.
Fact-Checks
In the unlikely event, someone is infected despite the mRNA vaccine, they will shed significantly less of the virus. Unvaccinated people had 4x the viral load compared to vaccinated people who were infected—something that is uncommon but not impossible. In those cases, the vaccine protects virtually everyone from hospitalization and severe disease.
Debunked prion disease link to mRNA study resurfaces
We addressed this claim in a previous newsletter.
mRNA treatment may do the opposite of the claims, which say the vaccine causes neurodegenerative diseases.
mRNA treatment prevented the death of neurons when dosed 2 days after ischemia in rats. Long-term experiments showed significant improvements in memory compared with untreated rats. The findings are expected to extend the potential treatment window for preventing neuronal death after the ischemic attack, and significantly improve outcomes for patients.
Is the COVID-19 Vaccine Called ‘Luciferase’?
We have records on the progression of this claim in the Hoaxlines database.
Two-for-one from Tucker Carlson
Tucker Carlson falsely claims COVID-19 vaccines might not work
PolitiFact Rating: Pants on Fire
Covid-19 precautions do not mean vaccines are ineffective
The doctor did not say George Floyd’s death should be ruled an overdose
American conservative political activist Charlie Kirk claimed in a video viewed hundreds of thousands of times on Facebook that a medical examiner said George Floyd’s death should be ruled an overdose.
This is false; the doctor, who conducted Floyd’s autopsy, testified that he stands by his assessment of the cause of death and his classification of it as a homicide.
As the Philippines struggled to contain a surge in Covid-19 cases, a list of purported home remedies to treat the disease recirculated on social media. The posts claimed the purported treatments were endorsed by a director at a Manila hospital. This is false.
In 2020, health experts told AFP the purported coronavirus remedies were not cures for Covid-19. The Manila hospital cited in the recent social media posts said the list was not issued by any of its doctors.
This claim has been made repeatedly about the United States and in several other countries. It’s not true.
We’ve used the same method for estimating deaths for over 100 years. There were no concerns until 2020.
Non-paywalled link: No-Nonsense American’s Guide to Pandemic Numbers and How to Tell If We’re Over or Underestimating Death
No, an Iowa BLM protest was not like the Jan. 6 US Capitol riot
Organizers of a Black Lives Matter-related rally in Iowa on April 8 obtained a permit, entered the Iowa Capitol in an orderly way, and protested bills. One arrest was made.
Many of the rioters in Washington on Jan. 6 were seeking to overturn the results of the presidential election, stormed into the U.S. Capitol, and committed extensive damage. Five people died after the insurrection and hundreds have been arrested or charged.
See prior issues for more fact-checks.4
Hoaxlines Disinformation Report
from the Virality Project
Viral Vaccine Narratives
Discussions about vaccine passports continued to dominate online spaces as states announced plans to roll out or ban using proof of vaccination for events and businesses.
In response, people have shared ways to fake vaccination status.
Concerns about AstraZeneca’s vaccine and blood clots continued to grow as the European Medical Association announced a possible causal link.
Detecting a vaccine reaction that is so uncommon should give people reassurance, but we’re not rational with fear. Acknowledging that disconnect is important. The more we hear about these rare reactions the more likely we perceive them to be--even when they are unlikely in the extreme.
Meanwhile, breaking news of the suspension of the J&J vaccine for blood clot concerns is already fueling vaccine safety concerns in the US. We will monitor online discussion around this event as it unfolds this week.
The high-profile deaths of Prince Philip and rapper DMX were both falsely linked to their recent COVID-19 vaccinations. These deaths, along with reports of more military members refusing to receive a vaccine, have promoted vaccine hesitancy online
False claims regarding priority groups for COVID-19 vaccines circulate
A site known to promote misinformation is claiming that vaccine deaths in 2021 are almost twice the amount of vaccine deaths during the last decade. Data for this claim are pulled from the CDC’s VAERS site, which contains unverified self-reports of deaths that occurred after vaccination.
VAERS data are not evidence of vaccine-caused deaths.
The site’s claim has been debunked by leading fact-checking organizations, as it misinterprets VAERS data leading to inaccurate claims.
Daunte Wright Was NOT Pulled Over By Police Because He Had An Air Freshener Hanging From His Mirror
Was Daunte Wright pulled over by police because he had an air freshener hanging from his mirror?
No, that's not true: Police have said that they stopped Wright because of expired tags and that it was when officers approached the vehicle that they saw something hanging from his rearview mirror, which is a violation of Minnesota safe driving laws.
Strange but True
Faith healer video causes public uproar
Faith healer entered a Covid high dependency ward to insufflate each patient in order to cure him accompanied by his armed guard and entourage, he blew air onto patients in an effort to rid them of the virus by “exorcising” it from their bodies.
Doctors and staff reportedly did not intervene.
Two Mexican men in their 30s managed to get the coronavirus vaccine in the capital by disguising themselves as senior citizens, but were later caught, the authorities said Wednesday (April 7).
With their hair and eyebrows colored white, the men visited a vaccination center for over 60s wearing masks and plastic face shields, the city mayor's office said.
Both presented false identity documents and received the vaccine, but their plan fell apart when they had to speak with a worker at the center afterward.
Research
Facebook loophole lets world leaders deceive and harass their citizens
The investigation shows how Facebook has allowed major abuses of its platform in poor, small, and non-western countries in order to prioritize addressing abuses that attract media attention or affect the US and other wealthy countries.
The company acted quickly to address political manipulation affecting countries such as the US, Taiwan, South Korea, and Poland, while moving slowly or not at all on cases in Afghanistan, Iraq, Mongolia, Mexico, and much of Latin America.
“There is a lot of harm being done on Facebook that is not being responded to because it is not considered enough of a PR risk to Facebook,” said Sophie Zhang, a former data scientist at Facebook who worked within the company’s “integrity” organization to combat inauthentic behavior.
“The cost isn’t borne by Facebook. It’s borne by the broader world as a whole.”
Facebook pledged to combat state-backed political manipulation of its platform after the historic fiasco of the 2016 US election when Russian agents used inauthentic Facebook accounts to deceive and divide American voters.
Scientists can’t predict the future, but they can help us prevent misinformation
Case studies from not-too-distant history illustrate how vaccination rollouts can go horribly wrong at the intersection of government policy, media coverage, and online misinformation.
The example of Dengvaxia in the Philippines is a cautionary tale as governments, including Australia, make adjustments following advice on possible rare side effects of the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine.
Spreading Conspiracy Theories on Twitter
Rooted in populism, the QAnon movement aims to evoke resentments of the everyman. Its series of confusing claims resemble the conspiracy legends of the past, but the power of online social media has given them platforms to share, promote, and connect.
Efforts have been made to reduce this power. In July 2020, Twitter suspended 7,000 QAnon-related accounts. In August, Facebook deleted over 790 groups, 100 pages, and 1,500 ads tied to QAnon and restricted the accounts of hundreds of other Facebook groups and thousands of Instagram accounts.
People who see TV and social media as trustworthy sources of COVID news are less informed
The study, published today in the peer-reviewed journal Current Medical Research & Opinion, surveyed 5,948 adults in Pennsylvania between March 25-31, 2020, and found that those who rely on social media and tv for news are less likely to get the facts right about the coronavirus.
In fact, adults that used Facebook as an additional source of news in any way were less likely to answer COVID-19 questions correctly than those who did not.
Recommended Reads
Theories About Vaccines Empoisoning the World Thrive on What Believers Don't Know
Why do I assume I know what the believers don't? Neither “big pharma” nor governments benefit from the general population being sick or dying. On the contrary, it's economically devastating.
Johns Hopkins Creates a Search Engine for Kids
"Searchin' makes it easier for students to find web content tailored to their reading level and is very useful to students with learning challenges who may struggle to find appropriate content on their own," says team member Dill, a first-year computer science major at Johns Hopkins."
[It is] is especially relevant during the pandemic because many students now need to use computers to find information on their own.
Vaccine hesitancy could derail California’s reopening. Here’s the plan to convince skeptics.
Gov. Gavin Newsom announced his plan to reopen California for “business as usual” by June 15 banks on a steady supply of COVID-19 vaccine and low hospitalization rates.
More than 31.2 million Americans have been infected with the coronavirus and 561,000 have died, there are still people out there who believe conspiracy theories that the pandemic is a hoax or a political ploy.
More news about misinformation and vaccines
How White Evangelicals’ Vaccine Refusal Could Prolong the Pandemic
Ford delivers 120 million masks to at-risk communities and launches PSA to combat vaccine misinformation
How the wealthy cut the line during Florida's frenzied vaccine rollout
African Immigrant Health Groups Battle A Trans-Atlantic Tide Of Vaccine Disinformation
Being vaccinated against coronavirus doesn't make you more likely to catch the South African variant
Are Birth Control Pills 1000 Times More Likely To Cause Blood Clots Than The J&J Vaccine?
The race to curb the spread of COVID vaccine disinformation
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Severe COVID-19 was defined as requiring admission to an intensive care unit (ICU), mechanical ventilation, or comparable treatment.
Hoaxlines has a list of hundreds of state-controlled or state-supporting media outlets belonging to Russia, Iran, and China. No, it is not currently publicly available.
“Volume III: U.S. Government Response to Russian Activities”
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