It appears the critics finally got to the U.K. Health Security Agency (UKHSA). The new Vaccine Surveillance report], released on Thursday, has been purged of the offending chart showing infection rates higher in the double-vaccinated than the unvaccinated for all over-30s and more than double the rates for those aged 40-79.
The figures this week continue to worsen for the vaccinated, with unadjusted vaccine effectiveness against infection hitting minus-31% for people in their 30s, minus-132% for people in their 40s, minus-113% for those in their 50s, minus-114% for those in their 60s, and minus-104% for those in their 70s. For those over 80 it rose slightly to a still abysmal minus-30%, from minus-34% last week.
Much less welcome was the report’s reinforcement of the claim that its data should not be used to estimate vaccine effectiveness. Earlier in the week, Dr Mary Ramsay, Head of Immunisation at the UKHSA, had said: “The report clearly explains that the vaccination status of cases, inpatients and deaths should not be used to assess vaccine effectiveness and there is a high risk of misinterpreting this data because of differences in risk, behaviour and testing in the vaccinated and unvaccinated populations.”
It is difficult to overstate how outrageous this is.
It amounts to Government attempting to redefine a basic concept of immunology, vaccine effectiveness, because it is not currently giving the ‘correct’ answer for the Government’s narrative.
Comparing case rates among vaccinated and unvaccinated groups not only may be used to estimate vaccine effectiveness, it is the definition of vaccine effectiveness, namely the reduction in infection rates in the vaccinated compared to the unvaccinated.
Continued at link.
Covid infection in vaxxed 40-49 yr olds double the unvaxxed rate – from UK PHE reports