Robert F. Kennedy jr uses a bibliography to cancel millions in COVID vaccine research but the document was created using a word search

"The COVID vaccine prevented 3.2 million U.S. deaths"...But, every day is another incompetent statement from RFKjr (Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, jr.). Kennedy cut funds designated for COVID (mRNA) vaccine research and used a 180 page report to justify his wrongminded, stupid decision. At least one social media friend wrote to her Maine Congressman Jared Golden to oppose RFKjr's actions.  In the newsletter STAT, Dr. Jake Scott, an infection disease physician, actually read the document referenced by RFKjr as justification for the cuts to research funding. In fact, the document is just a bibliography created by using particular search words, but some of the articles listed actually contradict Kennedy's false premise becasue, obviously, they were not read for content by an individual who could competently understand the data. 

Kennedy’s case against mRNA vaccines collapses under his own evidence: RFK Jr.’s ‘evidence’ doesn’t support ending the research — it makes the case for expanding it.* Reported by STAT

My social media friend Sally-Ann joins millions who are worried about RKjr's stupidity, so she immediately sent an email to Maine Congressman Jared Golden. The news always reminds me of the book title from the 1980s--A Confederacy of Dunces. (A good book--I've read it probably a dozen times, but not recently.) I decided I would just type and not worry about a pretty letter, because I am already worried.

Dear Congressman Golden: First I would like to thank you for the work you are doing in Washington D.C. in these unprecedented times. It seems that daily we have bad news that touches us or people we love. Today's news comes from Robert Kennedy Jr., who is not going to renew contracts for rna vaccines in spite of their wide-spread use and effectiveness.

Back in the 1970s, I worked as a Certified Nuring Assistant (CNA) for three years. During these years I put myself through nursing school. After that I worked as an R.N. for 41 years. I worked in med-surg units, in an ICU, in home care, and in both inpatient and outpatient psychiatry and addiction medicine. I now am working as a volunteer Faith Community Nurse, and still have my nursing license.

I also worked during the pandemic, giving vaccines to people at the Augusta Civic Center. (And even President Trump benefited from the COVID vaccine!) That was some of the most rewarding work of my career. People were so grateful to receive the vaccines. Many of them had not seen their families since the beginning of the pandemic, and the vaccine was their ticket to traveling to see their children.
Now that RFKjr is wielding his power, things are different. He is not qualified for the position he is in. I hope Congress can do something about this travesty--at least regarding the mRNA vaccines, which have saved so may lives.

*When Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. terminated $500 million in federal funding for mRNA vaccine research last week, claiming he had “reviewed the science,” his press release linked to a 181-page document as justification.  After reviewing Kennedy’s “evidence”,  it doesn’t support ending mRNA vaccine development. It makes the case for expanding it.

The document isn’t a government analysis or systematic review. 

Rather, it’s a bibliography assembled by outside authors that, according to its own title page, “originated with contributions to TOXIC SHOT: Facing the Dangers of the COVID ‘Vaccines’” with a foreword by Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.). The lead compiler is a dentist, not an immunologist, virologist, or vaccine expert.

NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya has suggested the funding was terminated due to lack of public trust in mRNA vaccines. 

But misrepresenting evidence to justify policy decisions is precisely what erodes public trust. If we want to restore confidence in public health, we need to start by accurately representing what the science actually says.

Here’s what Kennedy obviously missed: Most of the compiled papers are in vitro studies (laboratory experiments in test tubes or petri dishes) documenting effects of SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, not vaccination. These laboratory experiments, while limited in their clinical relevance and unable to establish causation, consistently show harmful effects from the spike protein produced during infection. The implicit message throughout: Infection produces spike protein that can cause harm, therefore vaccination, which produces controlled amounts of spike without the virus making copies of itself, makes sense.

Some of the papers included in the bibliography are even explicit about this. One examining neurological effects concludes “the benefits of COVID-19 vaccination far outweigh the risks of a neurological complication.” Another review in the packet directly compares infection with vaccination and concludes vaccination is “the more favorable option for protection.” Kennedy is literally citing evidence that contradicts his position.

The document’s methodology reveals how this happened. The authors of the compilation acknowledge that “most in vitro studies cited here used recombinant spike proteins or spike proteins in pseudoviral vectors,” not actual vaccines. They grabbed papers using any mention of spike protein, whether from infection or vaccination, and presented them as evidence against vaccines.

The apparent deception runs deeper. Multiple cited studies inject spike protein or mRNA intravenously into mice, inducing myocarditis, or even directly into brain tissue, routes obviously never used in human vaccination. (Vaccines are injected into shoulder muscle.) The packet includes studies with hippocampal injection of spike, brain infusion in mice, and injection into cerebrospinal fluid. While these experiments help identify theoretical hazards, they reveal nothing about the real-world risk from the intended intramuscular injection in humans.

When it isn’t misreading studies’ conclusions, the compilation uses them in an intellectually dishonest way. For instance, it misleads about how long spike protein stays in the body. It cites studies showing spike protein from SARS-CoV-2 infection lasting months, driven by the virus continuously making copies of itself, to suggest vaccine spike persists similarly.

But vaccine spike typically clears within two weeks because there’s no replicating virus. Those who assembled the document know this distinction but obscure it.

The safety distortions are egregious. The document highlights anaphylaxis rates as high as 1 in 2,280 doses from selective studies, while systematic CDC surveillance estimates 4.5 per million doses, 400 times lower. 

They emphasize myocarditis (a treatable infection in the cardiac muscle) in young males, which peaked at about 100 per million among males ages 16-17 after the second dose, without mentioning that SARS-CoV-2 infection causes myocarditis at higher rates with worse outcomes, or that rates have since dropped to background levels.

Most damning is what’s absent. The compilation ignores the Danish nationwide study of approximately 1 million JN.1 booster recipients that found no increased risk for 29 specified conditions. It omits the Global Vaccine Data Network analysis of 99 million vaccinated across multiple countries finding no new or hidden safety signals. It excludes CDC data showing the unvaccinated had a 53-fold higher risk of death during Delta, demonstrating the critical importance of mRNA vaccination. The Commonwealth Fund estimates Covid vaccines prevented approximately 3.2 million U.S. deaths through 2022.

The papers themselves often contradict the compilation’s framing. Multiple studies state “we cannot infer any causality” from their findings. The document’s own sources describe challenges as surmountable, not fatal flaws. 

Nevertheless, the incompetent Kennedy presents these tentative findings, which the authors themselves call preliminary, as definitive evidence requiring immediate action.

Beyond Covid vaccines, Kennedy’s decision undermines pandemic preparedness. The 22 terminated projects worth $500 million represent the expensive late-stage development that BARDA uniquely funds — Phase 3 trials, manufacturing scale-up, and strategic stockpiling that private companies can’t afford. Kennedy promises “safer, broader, whole-virus vaccines” as alternatives, apparently unaware these take six months minimum to update versus weeks for mRNA. When the next pandemic virus emerges, those extra months will translate directly into preventable deaths.

I’ve analyzed Covid vaccine safety data intensively since 2020. There are real discussions to have about rare side effects, risk communication, and policy trade-offs. But those require honest representation of evidence.

What Kennedy has done is different. Most papers in the compilation found infection-related harms, evidence that actually supports vaccination, yet he is wielding it against vaccines. 😓😕💢He’s citing sources that explicitly support vaccination while claiming they oppose it.

This isn’t scientific disagreement. It’s either staggering incompetence or willful misrepresentation. When half-billion-dollar decisions affecting pandemic preparedness rest on such foundations, the scientific community must respond clearly: Kennedy is using evidence that refutes his own position to justify dismantling tools we’ll desperately need when the next pandemic arrives.

Jake Scott, M.D., is an infectious disease physician and clinical associate professor at Stanford University School of Medicine.

Congressman is right to change view on banning weapons of war

Echo opinion published in the Portland Press Herald and The Post Star, a Glenn Falls, New York newspaper.

#TheNewYorkTimes reports:  "Representative Jared Golden of Maine, a centrist Democrat, called for a ban on assault weapons Thursday afternoon, reversing a long-held stance after 18 people were killed in a mass shooting in Lewiston," Emily Cochrane.

EDITORIAL:  In the devastating aftermath of the mass shootings in Lewiston, Maine, the Press Herald editorial board is calling on U.S. Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Angus King, I-Maine, to support a workable federal ban on assault rifles — however they wish to get there.

As a solemn attempt to weaken the sickening grip the threat of gun violence has on our families and our neighbors, as an acknowledgment of the consequences of decades of failure to take this action and as an act of faith in the future of our state, nothing less than an effective ban on the sale of military-style assault rifles can do.

No credible argument in favor of continuing to allow these guns onto store shelves and into our communities can be made or has ever been made.

Three of four, with Democratic Rep. Chellie Pingree as the longstanding exception — until last Thursday night. Referring to "false confidence" in abstract ideas about local safety and control and "many other misjudgments," Rep. Golden stood up at a lectern and told the public that he had reconsidered his position on the accessibility of "weapons of war."

Among the memorable lines from the congressman's speech, one stood out to us: "Humility is called for as accountability is sought."

Humility is called for. In contemporary politics, any change of mind or approach is remarkable enough. In choosing to take responsibility for his failure, however, in explicitly asking for forgiveness and support from his constituents in the 2nd Congressional District, Golden went further than that. What we saw was a rare display of moral courage.

"Sometimes things happen that bring your worst nightmares to life," Golden said of his own tipping point, the mass shootings in his hometown that left 18 people dead.

Our reporting back in May, which followed the April shootings in Bowdoin and Yarmouth, was characterized as much by the delegates' reluctance to support an assault weapons ban as it was their reluctance to tell the public exactly why.

And yet, as the Press Herald reported in stark detail in May, three of four members of Maine's congressional delegation — Sens. Collins and King and Democratic Rep. Jared Golden — withheld their support for a ban, despite a majority of voters now strongly supporting it in principle.

The positions of Sens. Collins and King on an assault weapons ban are different.

Collins has previously explained that past proposals have been too broad. King has repeatedly expressed concern that the proposed bans he has encountered so far would be too weak, too easy for manufacturers to find their way around. The senator has instead been focused on placing limits on functional elements like high-capacity magazines and bump stocks.

In the immediate, emotional aftermath of a tragedy like Lewiston's, reservations about the content or form of any proposal to ban these weapons outright is particularly hard for us to accept.

Defenders of the right to access to automatic and semi-automatic rifles do the same thing when they wring hands about regulatory overstep that would deprive gun owners of choice, or quibble about what qualifies as a modern sporting rifle, as if it were a term that could not reasonably be defined.

The upshot of staying in the weeds is that our elected representatives have been at odds about what a ban on assault weapons should or should not look like for years on end. All the while, new assault weapons are being sold into our towns and cities — more than 20 million are now in circulation. 

That is not to say that there is not critical detail and definition that needs to be carefully negotiated. But at some point, and we firmly believe that point is now, lawmakers must set aside differing ideals and get real about putting an end to the availability of these guns.

Responding to the events in Lewiston, President Biden urged lawmakers in Congress to "end immunity from liability for gun manufacturers."

In calling for our senators to lend their support to a ban on assault weapons, we are urging the same. Until that happens, it should not be hard for anybody to say that these guns simply do not belong in people's hands. And how best to achieve that end? By instituting a federal ban on their sale.

Maine Republican legislators have a lot of explaining to do: Yellow Flag law failed

Editorial echo published in the Boston Globe:

After Maine shootings, our grim ritual returns: burying the dead, pleading for better gun laws.  With some of the region’s most permissive firearm laws, Maine has been a poster child for the nation’s political paralysis on gun safety.

Congressman Jared Golden

There are two important, if crushingly familiar, early takeaways from the massacre of 18 people in Lewiston, Maine, on Wednesday evening, a death toll almost certain to rise. 

One is that the nation is facing a mental health crisis and has a critical shortage of mental health professionals to help it cope with that crisis.

The other is that it is far too easy to acquire firearms in Maine, particularly assault-style weapons whose main function is the swift and efficient killing of human beings, full stop.

Regarding the nation’s mental health crisis, there is much agreement across the political spectrum about the depth and breadth of the problem, as well as about the importance of doing more. 

Whether political leaders in Washington and state capitals can find the political will to allocate the required resources — and whether our educational institutions can recruit and train enough mental health caregivers — are works in progress.

But on the issue of imposing even the most common-sense restrictions on the powerful killing tools made by the firearms industry, the nation is hopelessly divided. Divided between liberals and conservatives, between rural areas and urban ones, even between men and women.

Maine is a poster child for the nation’s political paralysis on gun safety. Though the state government is controlled by the Democratic Party, the Legislature rejected a bounty of gun safety bills earlier this year, including a ban on rapid-fire devices, a 72-hour waiting period to purchase firearms and background checks for private gun sales.

Maine is among the nation’s most sparsely populated states — one where nearly half of adults have a gun at home and where hunting is a beloved pastime. That means that when it comes to gun issues, culture and geography may be as or even more important than party politics.

But once in a while, the hope of progress can rise from the ashes of tragedy. On Thursday, Representative Jared Golden, a Democrat from Lewiston who represents the vast northern half of Maine, declared that he had changed his mind about opposing a ban on assault weapons. In an emotional mea culpa, Golden, a former Marine infantryman who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, called his opposition to the ban “a failure” and pledged to work “with any colleague to get this done in the time that I have left in Congress.”

(Alas, Maine’s senior US senator, Susan Collins, said she would continue to oppose banning assault weapons. But Collins, a moderate Republican who played a constructive role in passage of a gun-safety measure in Congress last year, said she does support setting limits on high-capacity magazines, an incremental but valuable step.)

The real work, however, must start in Augusta. With the possible exception of Republican-dominated New Hampshire, Maine has the laxest gun laws in the Northeast. Currently, in Maine, there is little to stop, say, an abusive spouse from purchasing a semiautomatic weapon from an unlicensed dealer online or at a gun show because the state does not require background checks on private sales. Likewise, because the state does not have a waiting period on gun purchases, a person who is gripped by suicidal thoughts can walk into a gun store and purchase a handgun on the spur of the moment.

We still know little about the background and motives of the man accused in the Lewiston massacre, Robert R. Card II. An Army reservist, he was, according to various published reports, an expert marksman who, after living a quiet life on his family’s farm, struggled with mental health problems during the past year, including hearing voices at the bar and bowling alley where the killings occurred. Several outlets reported that he had received a mental health evaluation this summer due to “erratic” behavior and may have received treatment.

It also seems clear from surveillance photos that the man who killed or maimed all those people — those average Maine citizens who were innocently sipping beers or enjoying a night of bowling with friends — used a military-style assault rifle with its enhanced capability to rapidly fire more, and more lethal, rounds with the mere bending of a finger.

These details are sure to evolve as more reporting emerges. But huge questions remain. If in fact the suspect was hospitalized for mental health care, shouldn’t authorities have moved to have his firearms temporarily removed, as is allowed under the state’s so-called yellow flag law?

Gun safety advocates want to revise that law to make it simpler for family members to ask a judge to temporarily separate a person judged harmful to themselves or others from their firearms, as is allowed under stricter red flag laws that exist in 19 states. But one is left wondering whether anyone attempted to apply even the weaker yellow flag law to the alleged shooter. Did the alleged shooter’s family or Army Reserve colleagues even know it exists?

These are questions the Maine Legislature should begin debating. And a full range of laws, including a ban on high-capacity magazines and assault weapons, background checks on private sales, and a red flag law, should be on the table.

Opponents of gun safety laws will argue that, even with its lax laws, Maine has relatively little gun violence, that restrictions on gun ownership do not deter criminals, and that, well, the Second Amendment trumps all.

But suicide remains a major health issue in Maine, and nationally firearms are the most common means of killing oneself. Though the number of suicides declined last year from the previous year, the overall rate is well above two decades ago. And even the US Supreme Court, the most conservative and pro-gun court in decades, has said that some restrictions on gun ownership are constitutional.

Perhaps the most infuriating argument sure to come from gun rights activists is that most gun owners are law abiding and shouldn’t be put through the hassles and costs imposed by gun safety laws. They will also say that gun violence and mass shootings will occur with or without more restrictions.

The latter is of course true. But data show that the states with the lowest rates of gun fatalities — Hawaii and Massachusetts — also have among the most restrictive gun laws. And as to the former: Are we as a society prepared to say that inconveniences imposed on one group should outweigh the ability to save the lives of some, even a few, of our fellow citizens?

The choice should be clear.