Thread by @EmpireinWinter

From the hippies at
Medicina (Kaunas) 2021 Feb 26;57(3):199.

Pfizer official figures:
relative risk reduction (RRR), 95.1%; 95% CI, 90.0% to 97.6%;
absolute risk reduction (ARR), 0.7%; 95% CI, 0.59% to 0.83%;
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33652582/

To compare w/ influenza inoculations:
'A 1.4% ARR works out to a NNV of approximately 72 people, meaning that 72 individuals need to be vaccinated to reduce one case of influenza.'

'By comparison, Figure 2 of the present article shows that the NNV for the Pfzier-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines are 142 (95% CI 122 to 170) and 88 (95% CI 76 to 104), respectively.
Best case: 95% RRR and .7% ARR = avg of 142 vaccine courses to prevent 1 *symptomatic* case of C19

'Currently, differences between relative effect measures and absolute effect measures in studies are “poorly understood by health professionals, and even more poorly understood by patients.” [29]'

So maybe your MD is just mesmerized by the 95% and not gaslighting you.

'In addition,
“…critical appraisal knowledge and skills are limited among physicians,” and “use of relative effect measures was associated with greater perceptions of medication effectiveness and intent to prescribe, compared with the use of absolute effect measures.”
[29]'

'Reporting relative measures may be sufficient to summarize evidence of a study for comparisons with other studies, but absolute measures are also necessary for applying study findings to specific clinical or public health circumstances [22].'

'Omitting absolute risk reduction findings in public health & clinical reports of vaccine efficacy is an example of outcome reporting bias, which ignores unfavorable outcomes &misleads the public’s impression and scientific understanding of a treatment’s efficacy and benefits'

'Furthermore, the ethical and legal obligation of informed consent requires that patients are educated about the risks and benefits of a healthcare procedure or intervention'

So in absolute risk-reduction terms (ARR), 142 million complete courses (2 dose + boosters) of Pfizer will, if vax comes as advertised, will reduce symptomatic cases by 1 million. Nothing to sneeze at but 141 million people are still very much at risk, even w/ shiny 95% RRR.

And the ARR for you personally is not a 95% reduction of risk, given the average likelihood of contracting the virus, but a .07% absolute reduction of risk.

For this we should scapegoat millions of our fellow (still, perhaps) democratic citizens.

@threadreaderapp unroll