Thread by @mimifontaine

How the UK government, media and scientists were complicit in misleading the British public after Europe raised concerns about the #Oxford #AstraZeneca #Vaccine

A semi-satirical 🧵in the form of a PR crisis management guide, created using real quotes from March and April 2021

The situation:

Norway has made nightmarishly specific statements about blood clots they found in AstraZeneca recipients

The clots are really unusual and serious and will put people off the 🇬🇧 vaccine which would be a disaster for the UK roll out - and a knock to national pride

Step 1: Change the conversation to blood clots in general Watch from 1:48 as the UK’s absolutely, definitely, certainly not state-controlled broadcaster transforms the unusual clots into ordinary blood clots!

Cheers Ros and the BBC "News" team!

With every UK media outlet repeating the same misdirection, the entire nation now thinks Norway and other countries paused AZ for a few DVTs and have no clue the clots are actually incredibly serious and unusual.

Brilliant!

Step 2: Erase all doubts

Send the JCVI out to give absolutely definitive statements on the safety of AstraZeneca to dispel any doubts the British public might be having

Don’t worry that the JCVI is totally clueless and hasn’t even read the one page public info from Norway that would reveal exactly why Norway is worried

Lack of knowledge shouldn’t be a barrier to making unconditional statements on vaccine safety!

Step 3: Discredit the Europeans

People will wonder why Europe is making such a fuss over a few DVTs

It’s obviously all about Brexit

...and it’s just the EU being crazy

.... just typical EU incompetence

Special shout out to Prof Stephen Evans for the virology equivalent of "have you tried turning it off and on again?"

“The first thing ... is to be absolutely sure that none of the cases... have undiagnosed Covid”

Thanks Stephen. I'm sure they didn't think of that already!

Step 4: Scare tactics (domestic)

Enlist experts to intimidate the populace into accepting the #Astrazeneca vaccine using some scary hyperbole and metaphors

Step 5: Scare tactics (Europe)

Roll out some experts, including a very objective and not-at-all-connected-to-the-Oxford-vaccine professor from, er, Oxford University to make ominous predictions of death and doom if Europe stops using the #AstraZeneca #vaccine

Step 6: The sympathy vote

It's well-known that registered charity #AstraZeneca made the vaccine out of the goodness of its heart and not as a springboard into the vaccine business nor to make money off IP rights

They've given up PROFITS — why can't people just be grateful?

Artist's impression of — in the words of the always sane and stable MP Andrew Bridgen — the "unwarranted attacks [by the EU] on #AstraZeneca … a company that had taken the noble decision to supply the world with a lifesaving product for no profit"

Step 7: Stand firm

Even to admit the possibility of a problem with the 🇬🇧 vaccine would be a national embarrassment on a par with Suez.

The British way is to stubbornly press on and face any potential dangers headfirst — even if that means ploughing right into them!

Step 8: "No evidence"

Absence of evidence (because you haven’t looked for any and when other countries tried to show you their evidence you put your fingers in your ears and hummed God Save The Queen until they went away) is 100% evidence of absence!

Just keep repeating it!

Step 9: Win over the daytime TV audience

Get medical psychic Dr Hilary to confidently dismiss Europe's concerns on GMB

The Europeans will look pretty silly this time next week when this all blows over!

Step 10: Pretend you have omniscient knowledge of all blood clots

From the statements made by #AstraZeneca and #MHRA, you'd be forgiven for thinking that they somehow know every single illness or medical condition that befalls people after vaccination

But unlike in a clinical trial where everything that happens to the vaccine and placebo group is recorded and compared, that's just not how vaccine safety databases like AstraZeneca's safety database or the UK's Yellow Card system operate

Reports are only made if there is a *suspicion* of a link between a medical condition and the vaccine

Literally by design, these reporting systems only capture a fraction of problems that happen post vaccination

Luckily, hardly anyone understands this!

Thanks to the media's cluelessness about vaccine adverse event reporting systems and general gullibility, they come up with some smashing headlines!

Just imagine if the media's ridiculous take was true — it would mean the #AstraZeneca vaccine was more effective as a thrombosis prophylactic than as a vaccine!

Actually that's not a bad idea, maybe suggest it to Sarah and Pascal!

Step 11: Lies, damned lies & statistics gurus

Guardianistas need reassuring the #OxfordVaccine is safe too. Luckily, thinking man’s Carol Vorderman, David Spiegelhalter, has a column

“Think slow as well as fast” he writes as he instantly decides Europe's concerns are unfounded

David reminds us that only dunces see smoke and suspect a fire

In fact, there’s no fire at all - not when you pretend the concern is about DVTs instead of unusual blood clots in the brain!

Cheers Dave!
theguardian.com/commentisfree/…

Step 12: Own up — but not to too much

When you see the blood clot issue isn’t going away, have a rummage around the back of the national sofa and find a few cases to prove you are in fact very vigilant to these things

Just keep things ambiguous by saying the link isn’t proven

Step 13: Keep calm and carry on ignoring the evidence

Don’t panic when the Norwegians announce they found a link to the vaccine or when Germans make crystal clear the clots in question are in the brain

The UK media will just ignore them!

Step 14: "No one could have known"

The clots are a shame, but these things just aren't foreseeable

Don’t worry, the media won't remind you that Norway detected the issue after giving only 1% of the UK doses at the time — or that they warned you loud and clear about the risk!

Step 15: Downplay the risks

Now that you admitted to a handful of clots, it’s time to start downplaying the risk by making absurd comparisons — to things like being killed by a meteorite!

Don't worry that this hasn't happened in over a century - nobody checks these things!

Don't shy away from making ludicrous comparisons to the risks of normal life - like the risk of getting hit by a plane crashing into your home!

The Telegraph reminds us of these very real dangers we accept daily, from drinking wine to having a bath!

telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/04/0…

The Telegraph even makes comparisons to extreme sports - come to think of it, maybe that could be the next marketing strategy for the #AstraZeneca #vaccine!

Whatever you do, never remind people there are alternative vaccines without the blood clot risk — just pretend that the only choice is between #AstraZeneca or Covid!

Don’t worry, no one in the media will call out this false dichotomy or mention other vaccines like Pfizer as an alternative to #AstraZeneca either!

Step 16: Tackle AZ-hesitancy amongst the womenfolk

As ubiquitous JCVI talking head Adam Finn says, women already willingly take the contraceptive pill as a lifestyle choice

How dare they turn down a bit more blood clot risk courtesy of his friends at #Oxford and #AstraZeneca?

Step 17: Save face

Salvage some national dignity by claiming that a British person solved this terrible problem that was unfortunately created by other British people - after all, it worked for William Wilberforce!

theguardian.com/society/2021/a…

Step 18: Subtly distance yourself from the vaccine In the beginning it made sense to trumpet the Oxford vaccine as a Great British success story

Now that things are looking a bit iffy with the clots and other problems, it's time to start trumpeting the #AstraZeneca part of the collaboration instead !

Step 19: Throw shade at Pfizer

Why isn’t anyone talking about the blood clots caused by Pfizer? You know it's because there aren't any

But some 100% independent researchers at Oxford managed to cherry pick some US data that makes it look like there are!

marketwatch.com/story/blood-cl…

Of course even the most gullible journo should realise this finding from #Oxford University is a little bit too convenient

The sample was cherry-picked — thank goodness the small print was only read by internet weirdos and not journalists!

Step 20: Victims? What victims!

The dead don’t talk - and luckily the media won’t talk to their families

Cherry-pick a few survivors to show there are no #VITT victims - just happy, fully-recovered folks who encourage everyone to get fabulous #Oxford #AstraZeneca #vaccine!

Step 21: Make concessions, but not too many

Clot deaths are rising in the UK and slowing in Europe where #AstraZeneca is limited to over 55s — people might notice

Get Spiegelhalter to do some dodgy analysis to support a limited move away from #AstraZeneca — just for under 30s

It's unfortunately very obvious after ten seconds' thought that the books were cooked to make the #AstraZeneca risk look lower and the benefit look higher

Luckily, journalists don't check these details!

As a result of continuing with the #AstraZeneca vaccine, aided by the entire UK media and its scientific experts, the country with the most VITT deaths is…

You guessed it.

Probably don’t want to make too much noise about this particular world-beating statistic

To the complacent, gullible, useless British media who just go along with everything we say and the scientists who helped us pull the wool over the eyes of the public

We couldn’t have done it without you!

Your OBEs are in the post