Opinion pieces: Can you trust them?

By Jack and Becky Clark
Co-publishers

Last week the Town Crier published an opinion piece sent to our editor by Dr. David L. Greene, an obstetrician-gynecologist in Corona Del Mar, who expressed his strong opinions. Opinions ¬— that’s what made it an op-ed piece, not a news report.
One way to fact check op-ed pieces — including this one, mine here — is to look to see what citations to what authority are relied upon in the piece and check them out yourself. You can also look to see if the claims made therein have been professionally fact checked by agencies that are expert at doing the research involved in fact checking.
For instance, Greene’s piece commented on a verbal interaction between Sen. Dr. Rand Paul and Dr. Anthony Fauci during Fauci’s testimony before Congress. As Greene related it, you would think Paul got the better of the exchange, but Newsweek’s fact-check on the Paul-Fauci back-and-forth leads to a very different conclusion. (See https://newsweek.com/wuhan-lab-virus-dr-fauci-rand-paul-debate-fact-checked-explained-1591414).
Greene also suggested that hydroxychloroquine products — which have been proven safe and effective for NON-Covid related conditions — should be granted Emergency Use Authorizations (EUAs) for use in Covid treatment. But studies regarding the efficacy of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) in treating Covid-19 patients have shown that it is not effective (e.g., University of Washington, https://newsroom/.uw.edu/postscript/end-hydroxychloroquine-treatment-covid-19). Nor is HCQ effective in preventing Covid-19 in the first place (e.g., Case Western Reserve University, https://thedaily.case.edu/new-study-hydroxychloroquine-ineffective-as-preventive-antiviral-against-covid-19). But Greene wants hydroxychloroquine authorized by the CDC anyway. He points out that President Trump was given “non-approved” treatments. Greene does not mention that the president’s treatments did not include hydroxychloroquine.
At one point Greene suggested that an EUA (Emergency Use Authorization) should be granted for such Covid ineffective drugs so as to negate the need for the vaccines he describes as “poorly tested.” But the vaccines themselves were tested for efficacy and safety and authorized for use under the very EUA protocols that Greene wants to use to justify hydroxychloroquine use “off-label.” (Off label describes a physician’s use of a drug for a purpose other than as it was intended.)
Greene then followed with several paragraphs regarding the CDC’s VAERS system (Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System) and how 4,200 persons, out of more than 130 million persons fully vaccinated for Covid, died thereafter. He then asserts that the 4,200 deaths were “related to the Covid-19 vaccine program,” which might lead you to believe that those deaths were caused by the vaccine. That’s certainly not true since under the VAERS system, all deaths following within a specified number of days or weeks after vaccination can be reported, whether the deaths had anything to do with the vaccine or not. Consequently, when Covid vaccine is given to a very elderly person who already is dying in a nursing home it could be reported in the VAERS system as a death following a Covid vaccination as long as that person died within the specified time after vaccination.
Anyone can submit a VAERS report to the CDC, including family members and friends — anyone in the general public. The CDC website notes: “Remember, just because an adverse event or condition has been reported does not prove that the adverse event is caused by vaccination.” (https://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/monitoring/vaers/index.html) and “Specifically, a report to VAERS does not mean that a vaccine caused an adverse event.” (https://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/ensuringsafety/monitoring/vaers/index.html)
Greene cites the website of attorney Richard Jaffe regarding underreporting within the VAERS system. (https://rickjaffeesq.com/2021/02/19/what-the-heck-is-the-harvard-pilgrim-study-and-did-it-really-say-that-about-the-underreporting-of-vaccine-adverse-events/) But at that website, Jaffe reports that the Harvard Pilgrim Study does not support a sometimes-heard claim that less than 1% of post-vaccination adverse events are actually reported. Instead, Jaffe points out that the CDC’s VAERS program is a passive, voluntary program, then he says, “common sense might tell us that a passive, voluntary reporting system might well significantly underreport localized mild symptoms, i.e., a sore arm from a needle stick.” In other words, a sore arm is an adverse reaction to the Moderna vaccine, and we are all told to expect it — so why would we report it to the CDC?
Greene goes on to assert that the government’s vaccination program is a “crime against humanity” and that those responsible for it should be “brought to justice,” and, for some reason, he finishes with a pair of paragraphs referencing the Nuremberg Code — which does not apply to CDC authorized medical treatment programs at all, but rather to conducting experiments on human subjects without their informed consent, such as was done during the Nazi regime.
Whatever information you seek on any serious subject, you’d be well advised to fact check it yourself or see that it is fact checked by sources you justifiably can trust.
We were distressed and embarrassed as publishers to see the Town Crier printing the type of anti-vaccine misinformation that fringe websites and far-wing media spew.
We learned of the existence of Greene’s op-ed piece very shortly before press deadline. Better to have gone to press with a blank space there instead.

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