Who fact checks the fact checkers?

“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts”

— John Adams

One of the more interesting “fact checks” in the last week comes from this article, unabashedly sponsored by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. There is, of course, no conflict of interest present there. None at all (picture unrelated).

Anyways, now that we established this article is independent of any influence whatsoever, let’s examine the content.

This particular fact check has its’ target set on the abstract published by Dr. Gundry. We will get back to that abstract later.

The article begins by stating that none of the vaccinations have been linked to increases in the risk of heart attack. After all, hundreds of millions of doses have been given out. To the article’s credit (?), the author acknowledges that even the corrupt Center for Disease Control has given up trying to cover up heart inflammation in young men. Then the author links to an article talking about the risk of heart inflammation in the Israeli studies as proof that the risk is low and most people recover quickly and since the CDC has arbitrarily decided that the risks outweigh the benefits of vaccination, everything is fine. You can generalize my post on Mendel Singer and assume I feel the same way about the CDC to see how I feel about the benefits outweighing the risks, so I will not go into detail on that argument here.

But we need to keep in mind one thing: the “fact check” started off by saying that none of the vaccinations have been linked to heart attacks. How does the article in the space of one paragraph go from an absolutist point of view to “well, most people recover quickly”. Two days ago¹, a young man (26) from New Zealand died from a heart attack linked to the Pfizer vaccine. He spent the hours before his death frantically trying to find information on the link between vaccines and myocarditis. He may have even come across the article “debunking” any link. But I guess because “most” people recover “quickly” there is no connection, right?

The next point of attack against anyone that dare think there is a link between the vaccines and heart issues is… the claim that COVID-19 causes heart issues. I don’t think our valiant fact checker understands what constitutes a fact. While it may be true that COVID-19 causes heart issues, that does not imply that vaccination does not cause heart issues. The two are not mutually exclusive, and may, in fact, be interconnected. Here is the thing: she references a study out of Sweden that claims COVID-19 causes heart issues. This study tells us nothing about the relative risk in comparison to vaccination. Need I remind our fact checking friend that everyone gets vaccinated (three-four times a year it seems), and not everyone is infected with COVID-19. And indeed, some people, those with natural immunity, are at an extremely low risk of reinfection.

Our fact checking friend finally centers in on Dr. Gundry’s work. She and the people she cites are concerned about many things involving the abstract including the fact that it is an abstract. I will go over the absurd arguments against Dr. Gundry first.

• There are typographical errors.

  • The Shakespearean horror.

• Dr. Gundry sells groceries on his website.

  • Not everyone can be sponsored by a Johnson & Johnson proxy.

• The abstract is an abstract.

  • It never claimed to be anything more.

• The abstract is not peer reviewed.

  • This comes from the cheery notion that peer review actually accomplishes anything in most journals these days. That is not true anymore. There is no one going through an article with a fine tooth comb, which is why almost all papers these days are devoid of substance. The best peer review is papers being released to public scrutiny.

• Only anecdotal evidence is used.

  • This is incorrect. The evidence was based on his patient population (566), who he had years of data on, which allowed them to serve as their own controls. This is a more robust method than most observational studies in the mainstream.

• There is no statistical analysis for significance.

  • Does one need to be done in this case where the values are so divergent? I would, personally, do the analysis in my own work with the understanding that it is essentially scientific masturbation.

• One of the people the fact checker cites claims the increases to PULS scores is proof the vaccine works while noting we should all get vaccinated.

  • I suspect this is the type of person that would drink the grape Flavor Aid in Jonestown.

• None of the experts the fact checker reached out to were familiar with the PULS test.

  • Then they are not experts on the topic you reached out to them on.

• The PULS test is too sensitive.

  • Apparently, we should not be using sensitive instruments to examine potential adverse events surrounding these vaccines. We might find something. Yikes.

So those are the absurd arguments. I know I said I would go over the absurd ones first, but it turns out they are all absurd. Fact checking in 2021 is the new prostitution. These people will do or say anything for a few dollars more.

1. My timing is incorrect here but I will leave my absent mindedness in here to make a broader point — a similar situation could easily happen in the future to anyone getting the vaccine on the advice that it does not cause heart issues. Thank you Rich Seagar for the correction!