Thread by @BretWeinstein

Much of the anger in the replies to my tweet--some of it from friends and others I respect--is due to the sense that COVID-vaccination is a life and death issue. I don’t disagree. I too am motivated by that sense.

I don’t, however, think the matter is simple, though I’d agree that the vaccines appear to have saved many more lives than they have cost so far--by a lot. I’ve explored the question with nuance on my podcast and elsewhere, but on Thurs. my nuance gave way, to very bad effect.

Much of the problem surrounds my claim that my informal sample was disturbingly full of “scary” vaccine reactions. But ‘scary’ is a conclusion resting on a stack of priors that, without saying what they are, can’t help but sound alarmist. Here's the problem tweet:

Many of the reports I heard were of headaches, often excruciating, the kind that send a person to bed. Is a headache scary? Not usually. In fact, I have long been interested in their meaning as I used to suffer from migraines, which were not scary to me.

But when headache appears to have been triggered by a spike-based COVID vaccine, it’s a very different matter, especially if it is severe. I see four reasons to worry, but given the complexity of the systems in question, there could be others.

My concern begins with ‘spike-protein’ produced by all current vaccines. When spike-protein was chosen by vaccine manufacturers, it was not known to be toxic/destructive and it was designed to stay in the membranes of cells that produce it.

Unfortunately, spike protein is toxic, and it doesn’t all stay put in the membrane. That’s two known failures of current vaccine designs.

See page 20 in this PDF.

canadiancovidcarealliance.org/wp-content/upl…

If you search you will find forceful criticism of extrapolation from wild-type spike protein toxicity to vaccine-spike-protein. And there is a key chemical difference. But the fact-checkers protest too much.
politifact.com/factchecks/202…

The key difference involves vaccine spike-protein being “locked open”. That was done to give immune cells access, not to render it safe. So if it's safe, that will have been a very lucky accident. And the logical presumption goes the other way. The precautionary principle applies

Let's move now from the general issue of free spike protein to specific concerns.

The first reason vaccine induced headache is “scary” to me is that we have substantial evidence that spike protein not only crosses the blood-brain barrier, but tatters it, opening the central nervous system to toxins and pathogens
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33328624/
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33053430/

2nd concern is brain fog, a mysterious symptom of COVID, long-COVID and post-vaccine syndromes. It is known that damage to the blood-brain barrier causes cognitive impairment. Does a headache indicate impaired cognition ahead? A truly scary thought.
stm.sciencemag.org/content/11/521…

Third is the issue of clotting and vascular damage. These phenomena are dangerous anywhere within the body, but especially in and around the brain. Could a severe headache imply damage occurring circulatory vessels of the brain? Proceed with caution.
ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/CI…

Fourth is the issue of ACE2, its receptors, the “locked” spike-protein and its interface with the regulation of blood pressure.

Especially in light of pathogens (including SARS-CoV2) and toxins potentially moving through a leaky blood-brain barrier into an undefended brain, and possible vascular damage, there is a risk severe post-vaccination headache implies future stroke risk.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…

My tweet was bad and I know it. Without presenting the background, was alarmist in effect, and not clarifying. I apologize, I and I truly hope we can have a candid conversation about both the costs and the benefits of all treatments. The truth here is anything but simple