It’s a travesty, and should be illegal that this is being looked at in an ad how fashion. Proper clinical trials with informed consent is the only way to answer these questions and it’s unthinkable that this is how it’s being done.
It’s amazing to me that obstetricians (and midwives) haven’t stepped back and looked at the actual data before blindly parroting the “experts” and the drive to vaccinate all pregnant women. 🤔
I have been concerned on this ever since I noted the study trials did not do the research and then reviewing the NEJM study that seemed obviously flawed (it was later corrected).
In the UK the latest dataset from ONS on live births is pre jab rollout to most pregnant women. Normally it is updated in December. Not this year and on enquiry they say they have bo date when it will become available.
I read it a long time ago, it is from Dr Jen Gunter. While it’s not current it bears reading.
Mostly to see why the other side thinks what it does. She’s definitely on the other side of this argument.
She argues that vaginal bleeding is normal after a vaccine because the uterine lining is part of the immune system.
I’m not a doctor so maybe I’m missing something, truly, but,
I feel her argument actually .... makes some sense .... no wait for it .... on our side. Yes, our side.
Maybe not all the way, but if a vaccine induced bleeding at ANY time during pregnancy.... isn’t it DANGEROUS (not “safe and effective”) at least during pregnancy?
The other important factor: WHEN was the vaccine pushed out to women of childbearing age? Remember, they vaccinated old people first. In the places I've looked at: Alberta, Ontario, Scotland, women of childbearing age, by and large, were not vaccinated until mid-year. May at the earliest. More like June or July for most. So the big question to answer is: how long after the big rollout to childbearing-age women, should we start seeing a signal in the stillbirth data? Based on what I'm looking at (vaccine uptake by age compared to rumors of stillbirth spikes in Canada), it's somewhere between six and fourteen weeks out. So if the big vaccine push happened in... when did that happen in the UK? Like, when did they finish up with the old folks, and move on to the 18-40 age group? When did that age group reach, say 60% with at least one dose... and count out from there. Depending on when they were vaccinated, August data might not be late enough. We need to see September and October, particularly.
OK, this turns out to be a tricky one, because there's biases working in two directions at once, which I only have a hang on after working with a different pregnancy / births data set.
Your post demonstrates that the Covid-vaccinated are missing the discount that should be present for immortal time bias - they do not experience the full stillbirth risk window.
However, they are over-exposed to the cutoff bias compared to the unvaccinated in the same set. The cutoff bias arises because stillbirths cross the finish line before normal term births, on average. So any "among births" comparison will have this bias at both ends of the window, balancing out - last year's "safe" births in the beginning, next year's "early" births (incl. stillbirths) at the end, if using a year as the window.
Since the Covid-vaccinated do not start off by collecting "safe" births at the beginning of the window, the cutoff bias only affects them negatively - reducing the denominator for completed births. In other words, the immortal time bias actually applies to both sets due to the peculiarities of using an "among births" definition.
It’s a travesty, and should be illegal that this is being looked at in an ad how fashion. Proper clinical trials with informed consent is the only way to answer these questions and it’s unthinkable that this is how it’s being done.
It’s amazing to me that obstetricians (and midwives) haven’t stepped back and looked at the actual data before blindly parroting the “experts” and the drive to vaccinate all pregnant women. 🤔
I have been concerned on this ever since I noted the study trials did not do the research and then reviewing the NEJM study that seemed obviously flawed (it was later corrected).
In the UK the latest dataset from ONS on live births is pre jab rollout to most pregnant women. Normally it is updated in December. Not this year and on enquiry they say they have bo date when it will become available.
I find the ONS response very un-reassuring.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/livebirths/articles/provisionalbirthsinenglandandwales/2020andquarter1jantomar2021
Ah, here it is. There is a separate set of codes for spontaneous abortion i.e. miscarriage.
https://www.icd10data.com/ICD10CM/Codes/O00-O9A/O00-O08/O03-/O03
Z37- codes, including stillbirths, thus only apply to outcomes after 20 weeks.
So, exclusion of first 20 weeks equalizes the unvaccinated and Covid-vaccinated risk windows quite a bit.
I still think you're right that the Covid vaccinated should be lower, not equal.
I can't believe we have to have a polite discussion about whether experimental vaccines given in pregnancy is a good idea or not.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/livebirths/datasets/birthcharacteristicsinenglandandwales
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/livebirths/articles/provisionalbirthsinenglandandwales/2020andquarter1jantomar2021
These may help with age and gestation numbers.
Great analysis. It shows how deceptive numbers can be on the surface.
There is an interesting substack, Vajenda
https://vajenda.substack.com/p/the-covid-19-vaccine-and-menstrual
I read it a long time ago, it is from Dr Jen Gunter. While it’s not current it bears reading.
Mostly to see why the other side thinks what it does. She’s definitely on the other side of this argument.
She argues that vaginal bleeding is normal after a vaccine because the uterine lining is part of the immune system.
I’m not a doctor so maybe I’m missing something, truly, but,
I feel her argument actually .... makes some sense .... no wait for it .... on our side. Yes, our side.
Maybe not all the way, but if a vaccine induced bleeding at ANY time during pregnancy.... isn’t it DANGEROUS (not “safe and effective”) at least during pregnancy?
The other important factor: WHEN was the vaccine pushed out to women of childbearing age? Remember, they vaccinated old people first. In the places I've looked at: Alberta, Ontario, Scotland, women of childbearing age, by and large, were not vaccinated until mid-year. May at the earliest. More like June or July for most. So the big question to answer is: how long after the big rollout to childbearing-age women, should we start seeing a signal in the stillbirth data? Based on what I'm looking at (vaccine uptake by age compared to rumors of stillbirth spikes in Canada), it's somewhere between six and fourteen weeks out. So if the big vaccine push happened in... when did that happen in the UK? Like, when did they finish up with the old folks, and move on to the 18-40 age group? When did that age group reach, say 60% with at least one dose... and count out from there. Depending on when they were vaccinated, August data might not be late enough. We need to see September and October, particularly.
OK, this turns out to be a tricky one, because there's biases working in two directions at once, which I only have a hang on after working with a different pregnancy / births data set.
Your post demonstrates that the Covid-vaccinated are missing the discount that should be present for immortal time bias - they do not experience the full stillbirth risk window.
However, they are over-exposed to the cutoff bias compared to the unvaccinated in the same set. The cutoff bias arises because stillbirths cross the finish line before normal term births, on average. So any "among births" comparison will have this bias at both ends of the window, balancing out - last year's "safe" births in the beginning, next year's "early" births (incl. stillbirths) at the end, if using a year as the window.
Since the Covid-vaccinated do not start off by collecting "safe" births at the beginning of the window, the cutoff bias only affects them negatively - reducing the denominator for completed births. In other words, the immortal time bias actually applies to both sets due to the peculiarities of using an "among births" definition.
Thank you for your work. It's inspiring.
Have you seen Public Health Scotland’s “Wider Impacts” dashboard https://scotland.shinyapps.io/phs-covid-wider-impact/ - it has some very disturbing data..,