People will use any opportunity they can to conjure up a conspiracy theory, and the pandemic has been nothing sure of a gold mine in that respect.
Government: Be careful and wear masks, there’s a deadly virus out there!
Distrustful Citizen: Is there really, though?
Government: Shops need to close and we need to stay at home to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Distrustful Citizen: Nonsense! This is just your way of forcing us to cut down on bubble tea!
Now that the government’s objective is to get as many people vaccinated as possible, it isn’t surprising that there are a few people out there who believe that they’re willing to conceal important information just to achieve that goal.
Netizen: “Spike” In Deaths Doesn’t Tally With Info From Authorities
It all started with a Facebook post on Thursday (2 Sep).
A netizen claimed that she personally knew of three people who had died after taking the COVID-19 vaccine.
“As I started talking to more people, they started saying that they also know someone who coincidentally passed away after taking the vaccine,” she wrote.
She said that a fellow netizen from Hardware Zone had created a set of statistics for the current death rates in Singapore.
She said the stats pointed to a supposed spike in deaths, and called upon the authorities to “explain” it.
“Why are there officially 0 deaths due to the vaccine in Singapore? How come there’s a spike?” she said.
“What is different in the Singapore version vaccine that is different from US / Israel / New Zealand etc that we have successfully avoided accidental deaths?”
MOH: Not In Our Interest to Hide Adverse Vaccine Effects
It didn’t take long for the Ministry of Health (MOH) to respond, as they issued a statement just two days later.
It said it’s not in the interest of the health ministry or the Health Sciences Authority (HSA) to hide adverse events triggered by COVID-19 vaccinations.
“As a responsible healthcare regulatory authority, it is imperative to assess whether all reported (adverse events) or deaths are linked to vaccination since the vaccines are still only provisionally approved by HSA,” it said.
It added that so far, no deaths have been directly linked to the vaccine.
“There have been deaths that were due to concurrent medical conditions unrelated to vaccination,” MOH said.
MOH may have been referring to an 81-year-old man and a 72-year-old woman who passed away due to ischemic heart disease after receiving a dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
“Whenever an adverse event arises after an individual is vaccinated, we carefully evaluate the circumstances and defer to expert opinion whether the adverse event is plausibly linked to vaccination or not,” it said.
In the case of death, it said, it will defer to the opinion of a coroner for the cause.
One adverse vaccine effect that has been widely reported is the cardiac arrest suffered by a 16-year-old boy six days after receiving his first dose of a vaccine.
The cardiac arrest was triggered by severe myocarditis, which was likely a serious adverse event caused by the COVID-19 vaccine.
However, he also lifted very heavy weights that were above his body weight and had a high consumption of caffeine, which may have aggravated the condition.
0.12% of All Doses Led to Adverse Events
In total, 9,403 reports of suspected adverse events have been submitted as of end-July, linked to shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines.
This accounts for just 0.12% of the more than 7.5 million doses of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines administered in Singapore since 30 Dec last year.
Of the 9,403 reports, 389 – or 0.005% of doses – were classed as serious adverse events.
Yes, the vaccine may have some side effects for certain recipients, but as the authorities have stressed, the benefits certainly outweigh the risks at this point.
Learn more about the vaccine here:
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Featured Image: Mahsun YILDIZ / Shutterstock.com
