Thread by @ezralevant

1. Zuckerberg-funded AFP "fact checked" this tweet. You can read it here: sports.yahoo.com/misleading-pos… But in fact, they don't actually check my facts. They try to explain them away, which is different. It was an "opinion check", which most so-called fact checks are these days.

https://twitter.com/ezralevant/status/1474106318206255113

2. As you can see in the tweet, I just took a screenshot of a scientific study. It shows that, for whatever reason, vaccine effectiveness of Pfizer & Moderna vaccines against the Omicron variant turns NEGATIVE over time. As in, it's worse than not even having the vaccine.

3. I think it's an interesting story. Researchers say the vaccines have a NEGATIVE effect after 90 days. But even for the first 30 days, it's remarkably ineffective -- just 55% for Pfizer and 37% for Moderna. What's the point?

4. But look at the so-called @AFP fact-check. I have read it three times now -- I'm flattered they put so much effort into it. But you'll notice, none of the experts they cite dispute my statement of the facts. (How could they -- I just put into words what their chart shows.)

5. AFP spoke to one of the researchers: "Valentiner-Branth offered three explanations for why the vaccine effectiveness estimate in his study could be negative." So they're explaining the fact of negative effectiveness. Not denying it. How's that a fact check?

6. It's a Danish study, but AFP quoted some American bureaucrat to explain it. But he didn't -- he just repeated his usual message track: "The take home point of this is that, after three months, you need a booster." So he agrees: the effectiveness falls below zero after 90 days.

7. That same American (Dan Milner) told AFP "the study also shows how much protection the vaccines provide for the first three months." Yes. That's the chart I showed. It falls to single-digit effectiveness after 60 days. And it falls into negative after 90 days.

8. Then AFP interviewed a Brazilian who wasn't involved with the study. He just denied it all: "There is no vaccine that induces a greater risk (of infection). This is untrue, it is a biological fallacy." Says him. But the Danish study says otherwise: medrxiv.org/content/10.110…

9. Then they interviewed another American named Richard Kennedy, no connection to the study, who just said it MUST be false. "There is no rational biologic reason... It is more reasonable to assume that the study has some flaw in its design." So, a conspiracy theorist, really.

10. "Existing data pretty clearly shows that these vaccines are very good at preventing serious illness/hospitalization/death" he said. But the Danish study didn't dispute that -- it just dealt with infectiousness. Did AFP's "expert" even read the Danish study?

11. But look at that logical flaw: because past studies say the vaccines work, we must ignore any new information that says they don't work. That's literally the opposite of science: denying new evidence because you are so emotionally attached to your old theory.

12. But something rather dark happened in this fact check. One of the researchers said something to AFP that he didn't put in the study itself. I think he felt pressured to do it -- maybe that, if he didn't, AFP would label him some sort of anti-vaxxer! Here's what he said:

13. He said his own study was skewed in 3 ways: "vaxxed individuals are tested more frequently than unvaxxed"; they "detect[ed]... individuals who had traveled abroad and were largely vaxxed" & "unvaxxed may take further precautions and engage in fewer risky activities".

14. But I went back and re-read the original study: medrxiv.org/content/10.110… None of those caveats are in there. I don't think he consulted his six fellow researchers. The study description makes no mention of these possible explanations. I think he just made them up in a panic.

15. The study says what its methodology was; you can accept it or not. It said nothing about those three possible "excuses" for being wrong. One of the seven Danish scientists was targeted by an AFP "fact checker" on a mission to smear the study, so he disparaged his own work.

16. That's bullying, which is what these opinion checks masquerading as fact checks really are. It's just really gross that AFP took it upon itself to assemble a mob of anti-scientists, denouncing a major study because it didn't paint Pfizer and Moderna in a positive light.

17. But back to the original point: how is that a fact-check of my original tweet? I didn't try to explain the study or justify or refute it. I was just reporting what the study said. People's interpretations of it are their own business. How is that a "fact check" of me?

18. AFP boasts that they have "debunked more than 1,200 inaccurate claims related to Covid-19". But that's not true. They didn't debunk my claim about the Danish study. They just got some American pundit-doctors to smear some Danish research doctors. That's not really journalism.

19. I'm not worried by what some anonymous hack has to say about my tweets. (The smear is unsigned, which is odd -- why would a "fact-checker" work in secret?) I'm worried that this fake fact-check will be used to censor me and Rebel News. That's the explicit purpose of them.

20. If you read the fake fact-check carefully you'll notice it doesn't actually ever say my tweet was false. They try to say the underlying Danish study "couldn't" be true. That's an AFP conspiracy theory, but it doesn't touch on whether I accurately reported what it said.

21. Many of these Big Media fact-checkers are financed or controlled by Big Pharma. James Smith, for example, is the chair of the Reuters Foundation -- at the same time as he sits on Pfizer's board. I'm sure those facts are indeed being checked. pfizer.com/people/leaders…

22. Never believe a fact-checker. You are your own fact-checker. We all are. Fact checkers are simply a corporate PR "war room". It wouldn't be taken seriously if Pfizer got into flame wars with people; call it a fact-check, and people somehow think that's an actual thing.

23. Fact-checkers aren't journalists. They're anti-journalists. They're counter-journalists.