US Surgeon General doubles down on Facebook-bashing amid vaccination information blame game

US Surgeon General Dr Vivek Murthy publicly doubled down on criticism of Facebook for spreading vaccine misinformation, after The Social Network™ rejected his previous criticism and President Joe Biden's assertion it is "killing people". Things began to heat up between the Biden administration and Facebook last Thursday, when …

[Sgt_Oddball]

To be fair to Facebook...

Twitters pretty bad too.

Fairly sure by this point that anyone with more than a couple of numbers in their account name should be banned.

What gets me about all of the social media companies is that insane, dangerous crap is given the same weight as talking about the weather.

And like having a soapbox with a few standing around already, it never takes much to draw in a crowd.

It also should have rules about adding titles to names someone spouting off on one whilst being a "Dr" shouldn't be allowed (same goes for professor etc) and even then only if their specialism is openly declared (who wants to be given a lecture in how bad vaccines are by a homeopathic Dr? Or how 5G is controlling us by a Liberal arts professor?).

[Julz]

Re: To be fair to Facebook...

Hum, and who assess whats crap and what isn't? Us chattering apes chatter incessantly. Most of it is inane banal rubbish, some of it is interesting, some maybe misleading or dangerous. We always have and always will. All that is different here is the communication channel for the stream of chatter. Recently, we have moved to world wide chatter distribution system. Whether this warrants the sort of mud slinging and angst that is currently happening is debatable. I recon there could be money at stake ;)

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: To be fair to Facebook...Why?

We aren't talking about general crap. We're talking, literally, about 12 users who are responsible for about 85% of the anti-vax posts.

We aren't talking about general trolling, we are talking about a specific message with life threatening consequences in the face of a plague which has killed over four million people.

Facebook is the worst offender and it has no valid excuse unless you buy into their profits and Zuck's political ambitions.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Needle Nazis"

Facebook is being attacked as a proxy for Republican anti-vax messages here. It's not the medium they're writing their lies on, its the people writing those lies. The lies are straight Republican propaganda.

At the core of it, you've got a political party playing politics with a deadly disease.

If they succeed, Biden's vaccine rollout is undermined, their voters die, their viewers die, their followers die, but those deaths help them get reelected, and they claim success: "Biden failed, look at all these people he [really we] killed needlessly".

That's the core problem here. Republican politics, not Facebook.

Look at Tucker Carlson, claiming vaccines don't work back in April. He's been vaccinated, like the rest of the Fox News Liars. He is clearly doing a run for President on an anti-vax message. a) Trying to interview the big boss Putin, b) posing for staged "working man" pictures in Time magazine. If Biden succeeds and Covid dies out as its R0 drops quickly below one, then what hope does Tucker have to be President? None! On the other hand if he can keep R0 above 1, keep the disease rolling, keep his viewers dying, pin their deaths on Biden, he keeps his opportunity open.

It's pure cynical politics nothing else.

[Khaptain]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

There's no point in saying that only the Republicans are using it as a political playground.

ALL politicians and parties are using/abusing social media as their latest propaganda toy.

What's actually happening is that the government are trying to gain control over Social Media. Trump started to do it , Biden is continuing the same game but just waving a different flag.. The end goal is the same for both parties..

The government has become scared of what Social media is capable of controlling... and rightly so..

Zuckerberg, Dorsey and Brin are not politicians, and yet they now have more power in the fingertips than any politician ever had...

[Dan 55]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

The government has become scared of what Social media is capable of controlling... and rightly so..

Zuckerberg, Dorsey and Brin are not politicians, and yet they now have more power in the fingertips than any politician ever had...

The basic question is Facebook now have a list of a dozen people spreading 2/3rds of the anti-vaxx rubbish on the Internet via their platforms, and their accounts still haven't been deleted yet. Why is that? There's no good reason for it.

It's not surprising that politicans want to control them. They should be controlled.

[Headley_Grange]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

"Why is that? There's no good reason for it."

They make money from it and they don't care about anything else. They've already got insane amounts of money that's unspendable in a dozen lifetimes but, apparently, that's not enough for them and a few deaths here and there apparently don't matter as long as they continue to make money. The anti-vaxxers are also more profitable than normal people because they are more gullible and therefore susceptible to ads.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

No, not all, it's Republicans.

It's the Republicans that are undermining the vaccine rollout, its Republicans that seek to gain by engineering Bidens failure.

Republicans.

"Needle Nazi's" for example, my comment title, was Lauren Boebert pretending that the vaccines are poison and vaccine rollout is akin to Nazi's gassing Jews. One of her most recent tweets: "Biden has deployed his Needle Nazis to Mesa County,.... Did I wake up in Communist China?" she said, trying for a double dog whistle there.

"Marjorie Taylor Greene" did it too, calling doctors giving vaccinations "Brown Shirts". One week after claiming the mask mandate in the House was akin to the holocaust: "You know, we can look back at a time in history where people were told to wear a gold star, and they were definitely treated like second class citizens, so much so that they were put in trains and taken to gas chambers in Nazi Germany,"

Sure, she has to wear a mask, or be vaccinated, and its akin to Nazi Germany gassing jews according to her.

Tuckers run anti-vax scare stories, Sean Hannity has, Trump Jr has done it, Republicans.

Ron Johnson was kicked off YouTube for a week trying to push anti-vax lies.

It's not just lies abou the vaccine, they're passing bills that actively undermine the vaccine rollout. e.g. Ron DeSantis making it illegal to even ask if a person has been vaccinated, and making the issuing of vaccine certificates illegal.

He's even barred mask mandates.

So your care helper in your Florida old persons home, could be unvaccinated, maskless, infectiuous and kill you and DeSantis passed the law to enable that.... For a political meme.

Republicans.

[Khaptain]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

When I read the above comments I understand only one thing, that the world has gone crazy..

What kind of lives do you lead that you feel that it is necessary to reduce everything to Republican or Democrat...

Do you actually wake up in the morning and bow down and pray to your Republican/Democrat overlords thanking them for the bread that you about to eat..

Stop reading the nonsense social media websites, your neighbors are actually nice people and you can collectively can make the world a better place.. You can't do it alone..

The current political division using either class, race, colour or whatever flavor of the day is creating the potential for a very serious situation in the near future.... It's looking damned bleak because you are following the rhetoric...

Politicians don't care about you, they just want the perks of their positions/jobs.. Any and all of them would change sides at the drop of a hat in order to remain in power. They know how to play you and by playing their game you are encouraging them to continue...

[Dan 55]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

Are you really going to both-sides this? On the one side we have the world's scientific knowledge and on the other we have ignorance (wilful or otherwise).

The Republicans have hitched their cart to ignorance, but one would assume that hitching ones cart to the science should not be a political act but the default action which should be taken by most people.

Does that mean I'm being played by the Democrats if I support the actions they're taking during this pandemic over those taken by the Republicans? Are you saying I should be standing on the sidelines snorting "they're all as bad as each other"? Well, no, they're not all as bad as each other, some are definitely worse.

[Jellied Eel]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

Are you really going to both-sides this? On the one side we have the world's scientific knowledge and on the other we have ignorance (wilful or otherwise).

Why does that language sound familiar? Maybe extreme weather will lead to unexpected mutations..

The Republicans have hitched their cart to ignorance, but one would assume that hitching ones cart to the science should not be a political act but the default action which should be taken by most people.

Sure, but that rather assumes 'the science' hasn't become politicised. But a lot of the comments here seem to assume this has split by party lines and become a red vs blue thing. Republicans are 'anti-science', Democrats are pro. Anyone critical of Lysenko.. I mean Faucci must be locked up for their own safety and the safety of others.

But you could also argue that Republican anti-vaxxers are helping the Dems. After all, dead people can't vote.. Or can they?

But there is some genuinely batshit anti-vaxxer stuff out there, like the nanotech in vacines enabling remote control via 5G. If that's still going by the mid-terms, it'll probably be coupled to wireless tech inside voting machines and electoral fraud. But inside some of the discussion, there are also elements of truth.

So people are being encouraged, potentially forced to take experimental vaccines where their producers have perhaps better immunity than the vaccine confers. I think it's fairly reasonable to have doubts over novel tech like mRNA. There are also side-effects reported for those and pretty much all the current vaccines, but any long-term effects are still unknown. Once upon a time, Thalidomide was a safe medication for use during pregnancy.

Some of the side-effects are being investigated rapidly, ie myocarditis amongst young, healthy recipients. This is still a relatively low risk. But the science has also learned more about Covid, like it doesn't seem to infect/affect young people or school kids. So it's reasonable to wonder if vaccination has benefits, and if those benefits outweigh potential risks. Then again, we've used the good'ol triple jab or MMR to protect populations, but that's also where anti-vax kookery started.

And there's plain political stuff, like the origin of Covid. Trump said it may have escaped a lab, therefore it didn't. The Guardians of Truth jumped on that one as 'fake news'. But then where did it come from? And why did the US sponsor a Wuhan lab to do gain-of-function experimentation on corona viruses?

Or there's just the fixation on 'cases'. That's still shorthand for positive test results. It doesn't mean people have become ill. There's a blend of science and politics behind that. Cases increasing! Get vaccinated now! Don't ask why 'Delta' is more transmissable, but doesn't seem to have resulted in increased hospitalisations. Or why Sajid Javid tested postive despite being vaccinated. Or why BoJo is 'self-isolating' despite also being vaccinated, and previously infected. That's an interesting blend of politics, science and technology. It could mean the vaccine isn't that effective. It could mean the policy and technology isn't that effective. So the news stories about all the pinging telling people to self-isolate, causing more economic disruption.

But the more tests, or overly sensitive tests, the more contacts, the more pings telling fully vaccinated people to quarantine themselves.. Which doesn't really make much sense.

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

"But the more tests, or overly sensitive tests, the more contacts, the more pings telling fully vaccinated people to quarantine themselves.. Which doesn't really make much sense."

You raised far too many points for me to waste my time refuting all of the poor ones (the majority IMO) but no one has ever said that any vaccine is 100% effective in protecting the recipient from catching a disease. Some are highly effective, but not 100%. Most will reduce the risk, often significantly, of catching the disease and more so, will reduce the symptoms for most vaccinated people, but again, there's no 100% guarantee.

[Jellied Eel]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

Most will reduce the risk, often significantly, of catching the disease and more so, will reduce the symptoms for most vaccinated people, but again, there's no 100% guarantee.

But Republicans!

So why would this be? A vaccine won't stop you 'catching' the disease, much the same way that a PCR test won't catch illness. If the vaccine works, it just gives your immune system a better chance of slowing down viral replication and cell death. But both would require 'science' to test. So randomised trials rather than educated guesswork.

But where there's low risk or very mild symptoms in a population, then science should ask pointed questions about relative risk. So vaccination benefit/risk in a population that's at very low risk from the actual disease you're trying to protect against.. Especially if that 'cure' is also risky. So we have people with weak immune systems at risk from the virus, and strong immune systems potentially from the vaccine. One of the rules of medicine is 'first do no harm'.

But such is politics. The Dems seem terrified of the 'vid and thus want to lockdown everyone. Keep'em locked up & wearing masks, even if they've been vaccinated. The science would suggest that the biggest risk would be to the non-vaccinated, and that's just Darwinian. So to keep the fear level high, we've had hyperbole about '3rd waves' and new variants. Ok, so science can quantify some of those risks. Increasingly vaccinated population, falling numbers of hospitalisations, which would seem to suggest a low risk. Conversely there's also data from countries with higher vaccination rates than the UK with higher 'cases'.

So a scientific approach would be to wonder if 'case' actually has any real meaning.. Especially given the longer a virus is in the wild, the more infections you'd expect to see, so the more 'cases' you'd get. If those aren't translating into admissions.. what does that suggest?

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

"But where there's low risk or very mild symptoms in a population, then science should ask pointed questions about relative risk. So vaccination benefit/risk in a population that's at very low risk from the actual disease you're trying to protect against.. Especially if that 'cure' is also risky. So we have people with weak immune systems at risk from the virus, and strong immune systems potentially from the vaccine. One of the rules of medicine is 'first do no harm'.

The risk getting the virus is orders of magnitude higher than the risk of debilitating side effects from the vaccines. That's the relevant question about "relative risk". Asked and answered. By scientists.

"So a scientific approach would be to wonder if 'case' actually has any real meaning.. Especially given the longer a virus is in the wild, the more infections you'd expect to see, so the more 'cases' you'd get. If those aren't translating into admissions.. what does that suggest?"

"Case" does not equal "admissions". Never has. Here in the UK, "cases" have been ramping up significantly these last few weeks. Luckily, thanks to high rates of vaccinations, the hospital admission rates have, while showing a similar shaped curve, is lagging and much, much lower than the equivalent pre-vaccine waves. The death rate is even lower because the vast majority of "at risk" people have been vaccinated. But, there are still 10% of hospital admissions ending up in ITU, better than the pre-vaccine days of 20% going there. Luckily, 10% of a much lower number.

My neighbours daughter is a senior nurse in the local hospital. She's watched people die of this. It's getting busy there again now. They are worried. More so now that almost all restrictions have been lifted. They are hoping the peak will be reached soon because so many are vaccinated already, and fall as sharply as last time, reducing the rate of admissions and hopefully, because of vaccines and new treatments, hospital stays will be shorter.

[Jellied Eel]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

"Case" does not equal "admissions". Never has. Here in the UK, "cases" have been ramping up significantly these last few weeks. Luckily, thanks to high rates of vaccinations, the hospital admission rates have, while showing a similar shaped curve, is lagging and much, much lower than the equivalent pre-vaccine waves.

Sure, but in science, correlation doesn't always equal causation. So science is supposed to test theories to find, or eliminate spurious correlations.

So 'cases'. Someone's tested positive for a known, infectious agent.

We know there's potentially a more infectious agent, ie the Delta variant.

We know that as more people are tested for Covid antibodies, 'case' counts will increase.

We know that if there's a more infectious agent, case counts should increase.

PCR testing will show antibodies, but not necessarily which strain, or viral load. We also know that if high cycle counts are used, there'll be more false positives in those 'cases'.

So basically 'case' is largely meaningless, and an increase is expected. But we're told Delta is more 'serious'. If so, we'd expect hospital admissions to be increasing, which is a better gauge of how serious an outbreak is.. But that isn't happening. So you could assume that either Delta is a milder strain than the initial one, vaccinations are reducing the need for admissions.. Or because we also know that despite being double-jabbed, Javid came down with 'mild' symptoms, or just tested positive. And even though symptoms were mild, and the Cabinet vaccinated, there's still a requirement to self-isolate.

Even though initially, BoJo said there was no need. Is it possible that he has better information than say, the Bbc?

Or just for lulz. We 'know' Covid denial is a Republican thing because they're old, dumb and racist. But-

https://hillreporter.com/watch-three-vaccinated-texas-democrats-test-positive-for-covid19-in-dc-107145

Three fully vaccinated Texas House Democrats have tested positive for COVID-19 from Washington, D.C., according to Texas House Democratic Caucus leadership. They’re among nearly 60 lawmakers who left the state Monday in a show of Democratic solidarity to break quorum in the House, part of an effort to block the passage of a GOP-led elections bill.

Which has multiple levels of irony. Like the party of 'science' being on a private jet, fleeing Texas. And not wearing masks despite that being the law. And then giving a positive test result. Any idea why they decided not to wear masks, despite that being official advice? Especially when those 'lawmakers' have been a tad critical of the Texan Republican's Covid policies.

And there's additional irony-

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-57814213

There has been concern among liberals that the Biden administration is not taking seriously the threat state-level voting laws pose to Democratic candidates in forthcoming elections - and has not shown a willingness to take aggressive action in Congress to push through new national rules.

Especially amusing because the legislation the Texas super-spreaders are fleeing is simply to ensure that only those legally entitled to vote, can vote. So rather than being a threat to democracy, it should strengthen it.. Unless Dems rely on illegal votes. But that, of course was a different bit of 'fake news'.

[gandalfcn]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

"Sure, but in science, correlation doesn't always equal causation. " Really? Scientists are actually aware of that, contrary to the belief of idiots.

In the non scientific world correlation doesn't always equal causation either but your GOP idols believe it does. Which is why they are bigoted, il informe racists.

[gandalfcn]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

"But Republicans!" But Republicans tell lie after lie, they are nit asking questions, if they did they they wouldn't spout total bollocks.

"Especially given the longer a virus is in the wild, the more infections you'd expect to see". More bollocks. Most viruses are species specific and are rampant, its just that as we destroy the environment we have more contact with the animals carrying them.

You wouldn't know a scientific approach if it kicked you in the goolies.

[gandalfcn]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

Bless. Try telling the truth. The GOP politicised science. It did not "become" politicised it was wilfully made political by the GOP. Why? Because science proves them wrong about mst of their beliefs is why.

You seem to equate science with raving quacks, which says rather a lot.

The Rep. Party has controlled education below the tertiary level for decades and hates tertiary because it can't control it.

Ity is the home of the Flat Earth, ID, Creationist and YEC cults, et al. It is also the home of the lying deniers of the facts of AGW & ACC.

I received this comment from one of them "It’s time for people to understand that government USA bunch of lying devils. Trust God and Trump in that order. God is using President Trump to expose the truth about these lying devils like God used Noah, Moses and Abraham."

The ethos of the right is against science and pro biblical literalism.

The right is teaching ID, Creationism and YEC as real science and denouncing evolution etc. in many public schools and even more private ones, and have a policy that this should be mandatory in all schools.

According to Olivia Young, a student of astrophysics at WVU who also works as a science educator for a team funded by the US space agency, NASA, a lack of decent scientific education is part of the problem.

"Not many places in West Virginia offer physics programmes in their high schools and those who do very few of them are taught by people actually trained in physics," she says.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-49802038

Rep. school

https://cdn.acidcow.com/pics/20140207/funny_exam_answers_16.jpg

Get and education.

[Jellied Eel]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

You seem to equate science with raving quacks, which says rather a lot.

Yep. Walks like a duck etc. Of course you need some understanding of science to understand the quackery though. If you dominate the messaging, you can say 'wear masks!', but then ignore that advice when you're jetting off to Washington.

Ity is the home of the Flat Earth, ID, Creationist and YEC cults, et al. It is also the home of the lying deniers of the facts of AGW & ACC.

Indeed. Again, you need some understanding to become sceptical. Like the origins of Covid. Various theories emerged early on, some shouted down as 'fake news' by self-selected guardians of truth. But then evidence leaks out that the US & China collaborated on gain-of-function research in SARS-like viruses. Which I guess is an example of not-very-intelligent design. Other scientists had noped out of that research on account of it's risks.

But AGW is another fun example of science denial. See for example-

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57898718

Public Health England extended its heat-health alert until Friday, as temperatures hit 32.1C (89.8F) at Heathrow Airport, making it the hottest day of the year again.

Hottest day of the year falls in Summer. Who could have predicted that?

And it has warned that, as temperatures soar, some heat-sensitive systems and equipment may fail, leading to power cuts.

Power cuts you say? Oh dear. So cAGW dogma's telling us this kind of summer will happen more frequently than just once a year. cAGW dogmatists tell us we must invest billions in 'renewables' to prevent summers! Ok, so solar's doing fairly well at providing power, at least until nightfall. But here's a thing-

https://gridwatch.co.uk/Wind

The 'extreme' weather event currently being experienced is pretty calm, so strangely enough, not much wind. Of course this is a correlation the Bbc's science and environmental 'experts' might notice.. But they're not scientists, engineers, or even experts. But they are pretty much the same team reporting the 'facts' around Covid.

[gandalfcn]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

Congratulations on continuing to prove you are not only bigoted but also an ill-informed science illiterate.

[gandalfcn]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

"What kind of lives do you lead that you feel that it is necessary to reduce everything to Republican or Democrat." Ask that of the GOP and Trump, it is they who demanded it. A few years back things were different but the fascists and racists took over through Trump and the USA is nw a disgrace, a laughing stock where the GOP wants to kill people and promotes racism. Texas has declared teaching the truth about the KK is illegal.

So maybe you should back off and look at the real world, because the Trump GOP isn't going to.

[ThatOne]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

> The government has become scared of what Social media is capable of controlling

Used to be, since the dawn of time and till recently, that it's the governments who were controlling the propaganda. Because propaganda is the sheep dog who keeps the herd together, and most importantly, marching in the right direction. Without it you'd have to run after each animal yourself.

To their horror governments have discovered that now propaganda has gone rogue and is totally out of control. After a rather lengthy double take they are now scrambling to try to fix that, somehow. They will try seduction, threats, and ultimately violence, for they need to get back control of propaganda ASAP, lest their fiefs go down in chaos induced by social media crackpots...

[gandalfcn]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

In most countries the government does not control propaganda as there are and have been various media in which the government is taken to task for its actions. That is what infuriated the Tangerine Nightmare, and still does.

In the UK Johnson referred to the Telegraph as “my real boss” and was extremely concerned about the reaction of the right-wing press.“ i,e. the media controls him The same with Fox in the USA.

Do you remember Watergate? Obviously not.

You don't seem to have much knowledge or experience

[ThatOne]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

> there are and have been various media in which the government is taken to task for its actions

That used to be indeed, in some countries, but independent press is definitely going the way of the Dodo. Nowadays press and television are usually "pretty close" to a given party and will help spread the party line, which is what I call "propaganda". Remember, it's all about the party, not its temporary and utterly dispensable figureheads.

.

> You don't seem to have much knowledge or experience

While you're at it, anything to say about my parents' sexual habits?

[gandalfcn]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

Thanks for proving me correct. You are probably too dumb to realise it though

[gandalfcn]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

"There's no point in saying that only the Republicans are using it as a political playground." In the context there is.

[ghp]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

It IS the medium, and one of the media, that takes no responsibility for what it publishes. More crap equals more profit. Removing some of the crap afterwards is useless, they should be forced to moderate, like any other publishing company. Giving world-wide visibility to anonymous lies is not "free speech".

[gandalfcn]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

Indeed, Trump wanted to close down any medium that didn't grovel. Which is the difference now, but the Trump / GOP followers here are incapable of separating fact from Trumpism

[gandalfcn]

Re: "Needle Nazis"

The number of downvotes proves that there are a lot of deniers of facts and realities here. Which is a sad reflection on what the GOP has become under Trump. They lie daily about Covid and vaccines - blatantly - but the devoted believe them

They do the same about racism and voting. It is tragic what power hungry racists have done to a once proud country.

[oldtaku]

Completely true - Facebook allows and encourages anti-vaxxers

He's totally right. My Mom is on Facebook (noooo), and it's just awash in the anti-vax stuff. And Facebook, contrary to whatever they may say (they have always been lying a-holes), actively shows her and everyone else this crap because they know it increases engagement. I'm lucky I got her vaccinated months ago before she saw too much of this.

Yes, it's the dumbasses and cynical bastards on the left and right who are producing all the content, but Facebook is deliberately disseminating it because that helps them financially. Anything they claim to be doing to halt the spread is just covering their ass. They'd grind live kittens into blood meal if that were profitable. And spreading anti-vax information is profitable.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Completely true - Facebook allows and encourages anti-vaxxers

If 67% of Americans are vaccinated, how does Facebook's disseminating anti-vax bullshit increase their profits? Did all of the poor people get vaccinated?

[Filippo]

Re: Completely true - Facebook allows and encourages anti-vaxxers

I'm not entirely sure of what your questions mean, but encouraging divisive and controversial opinions helps Facebook financially by causing people to spend more time on Facebook. This means more ad impressions, which means more money. That's basically the business model.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Completely true - Facebook allows and encourages anti-vaxxers

"...how does Facebook's disseminating anti-vax bullshit increase their profits?"

By pitting people against each other to create drama.

Republican Vs. Democrat == FB_user1 ^ FB_user2.

Off topic, but if you add it up, then sadly it looks like Zuckerberg will one day run for presidency. In all honesty, without sarcasm, he really will know what the elderly demographic will need as he's the one who tells them what they need. Sounds crazy, but considering the USA's presidencies just included a rich man-boy screaming about his toys and now a relic who may not remember his middle name... But hey, you know what they say about being at the bottom: Once you've hit bottom... make a new bottom.

[gandalfcn]

Re: Completely true - Facebook allows and encourages anti-vaxxers

Not to high up in the critical thinking stakes are you.

[gandalfcn]

Re: Completely true - Facebook allows and encourages anti-vaxxers

YouTube used to be the same. /we used to complain and report posters endlessly but YT just fobbed us off. Until the 6th. Jan. when the chickens came home to roost and suddenly all the comments and accounts we had been reporting vanished.

We still get a bit of it with the BBC's HYS where the mods are scared to censor lies and disinformation. They had been a bit iffy about racism until the EUROs.

[lglethal]

"12 people who are producing 65 per cent of anti-vaccine misinformation on social media platforms"

Can we get the names of these 12 please? And then could someone please place a large order for tar and feathers?

Actually better yet, this being America, can someone who has had a relative die from Corona, who specifically and publically refused to get vaccinated after reading the bollocks from these 12, please sue them into oblivion! Maybe then they'll disappear back into the holes they crawled out of...

(from someone who has known people who have died from Covid, and another since afflcited with long covid. It's not a joke people, get vaccinated now!)

[Phil O'Sophical]

Tackle the problem at source

Can we get the names of these 12 please? And then could someone please place a large order for tar and feathers?

Or simply charge them with some appropriate medical offence and prevent them from posting on "social" media? That would seem easier (and cheaper) than starting a legal battle with the media companies they use.

[imanidiot]

The problem is that these 12 people are specialized in getting attention (and money) from their bullshit and know exactly where the line is. So they toe the line to where what they are saying is very very very close to, but not actually illegal or legally actionable. They'll be able to claim: "What people take away from anything I say is their own problem". They'll always put weasel words in like: "but talk to your doctor about what's right for your health" (One sentence after a 5 minute diatribe over the evils of X or Y) and that basically absolves them from being legally responsible.

[Potemkine!]

I call that Darwinism: if some are too stupid to believe some nuts theories, then Mother Nature found a way to clean the pool of their genes. If people refuse to gezt vaccinated and die, that's now their own problem, not the one of the collectivity.

Facebook's Vice President of Integrity

ROTFL. They like a good joke at Facebook. Sounds like "KKK's vice president of multicultural exchange", or "Spanish inquisition's vice president of ecumenism"

[lglethal]

Unfortuately it is a problem for the collective.

Because those idiots end up in our collective hospitals taking up intensive care beds and causing our hospital staff to be overworked. That means they potentially make mistakes elsewhere and for other people who havent been stupid.

On top of that, you have things like insurance costs which are averaged over the whole community which because of their hospitalisation drives all of our prices up. Sick people dont work, production goes down, costs of goods go up for everyone.

And finally, there are people out there that cant be vaccinated, not out of some stupid belief, but because medically they're either allergic to something in the vaccine, or their immune systems are already damaged and cant withstand the vaccine. The idiots not getting vaccinated, puts these peoples very lives at risk, and that again harms the entire community.

So whilst its nice to think that idiots not getting vaccinated is just hurting themselves, the truth is, it risks other peoples lives, directly and indirectly, and drives prices up for EVERYONE in the community. For that reason, these people need to be educated, to realise how stupid they're being, and how much they are costing their communities...

[Potemkine!]

Is it a collective problem it the collectivity continues to pay for the nuts who refuse to get vaccinated and get sick. This can be easily sorted. Or do you militate for mandatory vaccination?

I know there are some people who cannot be vaccinated because of health conditions. Sadly, for those ones, being extra careful is the only way to go, vaccine or not.

[lglethal]

I am actually honestly curious why some people are against mandatory vaccination? I mean your use of the term "militate" when talking about mandatory vaccination, implies strongly that you are against it, so can you explain why?

I'm not trying to call you out or be rude, but I am honestly curious. Most of the responses I find on the internet revolve around people claiming personal freedoms, etc. but that seems to conveniently ignore that we have plenty of laws requiring people to do things mandatorily (wear seatbelts, drive under the speed limit, not fire weapons in a built up area, etc.) especially where not obeying the laws can lead to loss of life (either one's own or especially other peoples).

So I'm genuinely curious, why would you not want to make vaccination mandatory?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because none of the vaccines (available in the U.S.) have passed all of their clinical trials. And I don't take experimenal medicines.

[lglethal]

Stop! That's an absolute load of bollocks.

Fact check it here at reuters: https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-vaccines-clinical-trials-idUSKBN2A22D3

That was written in February, when both Astra Zeneca and Biontech were fully past there Phase 3 trials.

Or if you'd prefer it from the horses mouth, from the WHO: https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/draft-landscape-of-covid-19-candidate-vaccines

Download the Vaccine Tracker spreadsheet and you can see (as of 16/7), all of the vaccines in use or in development, which phases they have completed, and a lot more info.

Basically, EVERY Vaccine available in the US or the EU has passed all 4 phases of their clinical Trials. They are not experimental medicines. And by not getting a vaccine and spouting that nonsense, you've allowed yourself to believe utter bollocks. So stop repeating it. Go and read up, get away from Facebook and Youtube, and learn the facts. And then go and get vaccinated, to rptect yourself and those you love.

[gandalfcn]

"people claiming personal freedoms, etc. " Your points are extremely valid but omit the most important one. If they demand that freedom then that freedom also gives me the right to kill them, which is the problem with the freedom advocates, they mean their freedom and no-one else's They are anarchists without a brain.

[MutantAlgorithm]

Plus the more people who are infected the more chances it give for new variants to arise, possibly with the ability to bypass current vaccine immunity.

[Stork]

Plus people who are on medication that surprises the immune system. Some arthritis medication may prevent a proper reaction to vaccination, which means lower immunity. My mother-in-law may be in that group

[John Brown (no body)]

"And finally, there are people out there that cant be vaccinated, not out of some stupid belief, but because medically they're either allergic to something in the vaccine, or their immune systems are already damaged and cant withstand the vaccine."

Living in the most infected part of the UK, cases still rising rapidly, on so-called "freedom day", I know people who until recently have been cautiously venturing out but now are terrified of going out for exactly the reasons you stated. They *can't* be vaccinated and *DO *NOT* want to be near people crowding together without masks.

[Anonymous Coward]

re: can't be vaccinated

Well, I'd suggest that they continue to wear a mask, if they believe that the masks actually have any impact on transmission. Otherwise, yes, they're going to be stuck in isolation until they die, and that would be terrible. (but would it be more terrible than getting -19 and dieing from it?)

[Phil O'Sophical]

If people refuse to gezt vaccinated and die, that's now their own problem, not the one of the collectivity.

This is one of the misconceptions about vaccination. It isn't just there to reduce the severity to you of a virus that you catch, its primary purpose is to reduce the spread of the virus within the community you inhabit. If we want this virus to drop to levels where we can largely ignore it everyone needs to be immunized, either via vaccination or by catching it & recovering. Since catching it has some chance of being fatal, vaccination is the more practical route.

In short, vaccination isn't to protect you, it's to protect us all.

[lglethal]

Just to add a small addendum to your comment Phil, catching and recovering does not always provide long term immunity from said virus. And the evidence is mounting that the immunity from catching and recovering from Covid is maybe 6 months at most. Vaccines however, can be tailored to provide that long last immunity.

A perfect example is Tetanus. Which catching and recovering from provides pretty much no natural immunity. However, the Tetanus vaccine does provide a long lasting immunity (although you still need a booster shot every 10 years).

Vaccination is the only good way to get the virus to drop in the community, not to mention avoiding the potential side effects of getting infected (e.g. long covid, and internal organ damage).

[Headley_Grange]

It's also important because it reduces the opportunity and risk of the virus mutating into more infection variants which are not controlled by the current vaccines.

[Jellied Eel]

It's also important because it reduces the opportunity and risk of the virus mutating into more infection variants which are not controlled by the current vaccines.

Or not. There's a few options for trying to eradicate diseases. So a while back, Londoners used to suffer from the Ague, aka Malaria. We couldn't eliminate mosquitos, so decided to reduce their breeding rates by draining the swamps. This worked. At least until environmentalists decided wetland restoration would be a really good idea. So policy decisions could be bringing malaria back to the East End. Where it'll promptly be blamed on Global Warming, not bad policy. Might also bring West Nile virus & other mosquito borne illnesses as well, but we're saving the planet.

Or we developed an exciting range of antibiotics that revolutionised medicine. Except when those don't kill all the bacteria, and the ones that survive become antibiotic resistant. Nature evolves, politicians devolve.

Or we do studies in our different hemispheres to track influenza mutations and decide which strains to vaccinate against for the winter season. We've been doing flu vaccination for decades now, but flu keeps mutating, along with limited immunity from vaccinations. Until influenza's gone the way of smallpox, we'll probably have to keep repeating this. Much as we will for Covid, unless that naturally mutates to less damaging strains, in which case it's just a nuisance like the common cold.

[Potemkine!]

In short, vaccination isn't to protect you

It may be for something else too, but vaccination is at first to protect you: it reduces drastically the risk of getting a severe form of covid.

The ones not vaccinated will get a form of protection at some time, either by getting sick and recover, or by getting sick and die.

The only other way is to make vaccination mandatory.

[John Brown (no body)]

"I call that Darwinism: if some are too stupid to believe some nuts theories, then Mother Nature found a way to clean the pool of their genes. If people refuse to gezt vaccinated and die, that's now their own problem, not the one of the collectivity."

I work with someone who's entire job is diagnosing and rectifying faults. Something that requires a logical mind and decent thought processes. He's good at it, so it's not just luck. And yet he's down the "conspiracy theory" rabbit hole, with no signs of surfacing any time soon. No amount of persuasion or facts will counteract all the "facts" he's found online.

He did point me at one site, so I had look. It referenced other sites. which referenced more sites, sometimes back to the first site. I actually tried to find the reference source material, and for most of the routes I followed, I ended up in circular references. "Everybody" is saying the same thing because they are all using each other as references, sometimes three or four steps away from each other. You simply can't find the start of a circle. No matter where you start travelling, you always end up where you started.

[Anonymous Coward]

circular reasoning.

Well, start here:

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-cdc-says-americans-dont-have-to-wear-facemasks-because-of-coronavirus-2020-01-30

And then visit the CDC pages from the same time-frame, i.e. before covid-19 began to spread began in earnest (that haven't been redacted/edited.)

Then read what you wrote again and ask yourself why.

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: circular reasoning.

"Then read what you wrote again and ask yourself why."

Two main reasons. Little was know at that point and few if any places had stocks of masks and the last thing needed was for large portions of the public to be ordering masks that the hospitals needed.

Medical advice can change based on circumstances and changing knowledge. That's how science works.

[gandalfcn]

"If people refuse to gezt vaccinated and die" And infected others, who infect others and so on. I trust you aren't in charge of anything important.

[Anonymous Coward]

Facebook, the dog turd dressed as a cream cake

Consume it at your own risk.

Best avoided.

[Qarumba]

Re: Facebook, the dog turd dressed as a cream cake

You are the only person on this comment storm with a logical and coherent statement of fact. Everyone else is either a democrat voting nutter or a republican voting nutter! I despair for America in the way that it has become so polarised.

[ThatOne]

Re: Facebook, the dog turd dressed as a cream cake

> I despair for America in the way that it has become so polarised.

So why don't you go live in Moscow Beijing?

/s

_{(Upvoted you. Totally agree.)}

[Anonymous Coward]

"We have a pandemic amongst the unvaccinated"

I think that is a good one line summary of the current problem.

Don't want to be vaccinated? Absolutely. Keep wearing you MAGA hat as a warning to others, and best don't rely on socialist Obamacare either when the entirely avoidable but inevitable happens - just keep away from sane people. Might want to use that gun to shoot yourself if it gets too bad.

Oh, and don't go to work in any profession that requires you to interface with many people. Teaching, medical care, homes for the elderly, shops, office - not the right place for you to be. Stay on your farm.

Get swine flu instead.

[Anonymous Coward]

Amazon

Amazon bookshop has become a nest of anti-science pamphlets too. Nothing being done about that either.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Amazon

We're returning to the dark ages, and we're doing it in style, with marching bands and all.

Science and rationality will (hopefully) be rediscovered after several centuries ruled by all kinds of irrational mysticisms.

[WolfFan]

Re: Amazon

The majority of anti vaxxers either can’t read or won’t read. Information hidden in books is completely invisible to them. This includes anti-science info.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Amazon

Books can be burned, there are precedents.

[Binraider]

Freedom of speech is protected in US law, but the consequences of freedom of speech are not. The consequences should be for the garbage spreaders to be identified as such and ridiculed accordingly.

Unfortunately, garbage spreading generates advertising revenue, so the critical mass of "fools" following the garbage ends up spreading the message anyway.

One part of the solution to this problem is to deny advertising revenue to pages associated with spreading garbage, which is something absolutely is something within Facebook's control (and other media formats for that matter). Kill the revenue, and at least one source goes away.

The solution to GB news publishing garbage from day one was for it's advertisers to threaten or pull support. And so it shall be with social media too.

The other obvious sources of misinformation are mildly hostile state actors, who short of outright engagement, are happy to sow distrust to further their own political aims.

For some reason people have the idea that vaccines being optional is some sort of freedom. If I were PM, I'd make it mandatory for anyone without a damn good medical reason not to have it. For the sake of those that are unable to have one. There are times where a collectivist ethos is good for not only yourself, but good for everyone else too. This is one of them.

Want to get the country opened up to foreign travel? Quit moaning and get double vaccinated. And get everyone else you know to get done too.

[JDPower666]

"Facebook's Vice President of Integrity"?!

What next, a president of the "We're nice really, honest" department

[John Brown (no body)]

Ah, that's what the new name of the PR department is!

[Anonymous Coward]

Aw, the poor leeches at Crackbook don't like being called out on the fact they spread ignorance and stupidity that causes deaths.

And it IS a fact - the blindingly stupid are allowed to post just as frequently as the well-educated, and if they say what the other ignorant people WANT to hear, the misinformation spreads among them like wildfire, getting pushed up and up the ranks.

By the time Crackbook gets around to DOING anything about the misinformation if people flagged it, tens of thousands of fools have already been misled.

[John Brown (no body)]

Facebooks "unprecedented" response.

Sorry Facebook, but I don't care your response in unprecedented or not. Clearly it's not enough. If you can't manage your own systems and userbase through lack of resources, then you need top spend some of your $billions on more "resources". Setting your techs to tweak some algorithms isn't working. You need more people actually responding to complaints and actively monitoring known disinformation spreads. After all, Facebook claims to know so much about their users (and everyone else), surely Facebook knows who the prolific misinformation spreaders are.

[Version 1.0]

Re: Facebooks "unprecedented" response.

But go back to the early Facebook days, remember the Republicans were screaming about Facebook deleting all the right-wing posts and being run by left-winger democrats .. Facebook "fixed" that by getting rid of the people monitoring the crap posts and now it's mostly right-wing crap.

But it's all crap, I don't care if you're a right-winger or a left-winger - if you've only got one wing then you're just flying around in circles and going nowhere in life, just building a pile of crap in the middle of your circle.

[ThatOne]

Re: Facebooks "unprecedented" response.

> actively monitoring known disinformation spreads

To be honest, some peoples' "disinformation spread" is other peoples' truth. Just look here in this very comment section. I like to think the population here is somewhat curated, lacking the more extreme spectrum of "crazy", and yet, opinions diverge, tempers flare...

So, who gets to decide? Whomever you might chose, somebody will be offended... Now before you all pounce, I do not, repeat do not condone leaving Facebook as the cesspit concentrating all humanity's waste matter. It's unhygienic and dangerous. Something has to be done, I just say it won't be easy. Don't expect miracles.

[WolfFan]

Re: Facebooks "unprecedented" response.

What’s wrong with leaving it as is, letting it grow… and then nuking it repeatedly? Get all the idiots into one place, and drop the hammer on the lot of them at once.

[Spacedinvader]

the removal of 18 million instances of COVID-related misinformation = good

and the reduced visibility of 167 million pieces of debunked content = WTAF?