We know that many people benefited from being vaccinated and that COVID vaccines had a big impact on the pandemic.

“We estimate that COVID-19 vaccination was associated with over 8 million fewer confirmed cases, over 120 thousand fewer deaths, and 700 thousand fewer hospitalizations during the first six months of the campaign.”
The impact of COVID-19 vaccination in the US: Averted burden of SARS-COV-2-related cases, hospitalizations and deaths

We also know that it is easy to create anti-vaccine propaganda to push the idea that COVID vaccines didn’t work…

For example, Mary Talley Bowden uses a chart with cumulative deaths to make it look like COVID vaccines didn’t work.

Tragically, this type of anti-vaccine propaganda did work and many unvaccinated people died with COVID! Surprisingly, this isn’t why Mary Talley Bowden is in trouble with the Texas Medical Board.

I guess the implication here is that there should have been a big drop in COVID deaths after the introduction of the COVID vaccine, right?

The only problem with that thinking is that with a cumulative chart like this, you are continuing to add your total count by adding any more deaths that occur. If there were no more deaths, the line could become flat, but it would never go down. Of course, in this case, there will be more deaths, because Mary Talley Bowden’s chart includes folks who are unvaccinated!

Now let’s see what happens if we look at weekly deaths instead of cumulative deaths.

Unfortunately, adding the death rate doesn’t give you the information you need to determine if the COVID vaccines worked. You need to know the vaccinated status of the people who died…

Now you can see the expected up and down spikes of COVID deaths during surges with new variants.

Unfortunately, this still doesn’t give us that much information on whether or not COVID vaccines work though.

If you truly want to see the effect of the COVID vaccines, you will need to look at the vaccination status of those deaths during the late 2021 and early 2022 surges!

“We estimated that at least 232,000 deaths could have been prevented among unvaccinated adults during the 15 months had they been vaccinated with at least a primary series.”
Estimated preventable COVID-19-associated deaths due to non-vaccination in the United States

And once you do, it is clear that most of those deaths were in folks who were unvaccinated.

Once you compare vaccinated vs unvaccinated status, it becomes very easy to see that the majority of COVID cases and almost all of the COVID deaths were in those who were unvaccinated.

Do you see the huge difference in COVID cases and COVID deaths among those people who were vaccinated and unvaccinated (most of the deaths)?

It is also easy to see that despite the work of anti-vaccine influencers who convinced many people to skip or delay getting vaccinated, COVID vaccines do indeed work.

If you are unvaccinated, hopefully you ready to get the lastest, updated COVID vaccine now…

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References

Yamana , Galanti M, Pei S, Di Fusco M, Angulo FJ, Moran MM, Khan F, Swerdlow DL, Shaman J. The impact of COVID-19 vaccination in the US: Averted burden of SARS-COV-2-related cases, hospitalizations and deaths. PLoS One. 2023 Apr 25;18(4):e0275699. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0275699. PMID: 37098043; PMCID: PMC10129007.

Jia KM, Hanage WP, Lipsitch M, Johnson AG, Amin AB, Ali AR, Scobie HM, Swerdlow DL. Estimated preventable COVID-19-associated deaths due to non-vaccination in the United States. Eur J Epidemiol. 2023 Nov;38(11):1125-1128. doi: 10.1007/s10654-023-01006-3. Epub 2023 Apr 24. PMID: 37093505; PMCID: PMC10123459.

Johnson AG, Linde L, Ali AR, et al. COVID-19 Incidence and Mortality Among Unvaccinated and Vaccinated Persons Aged ≥12 Years by Receipt of Bivalent Booster Doses and Time Since Vaccination — 24 U.S. Jurisdictions, October 3, 2021–December 24, 2022. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep 2023;72:145–152. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.mm7206a3

COVID-19 Data Comparing Vaccinated vs. Unvaccinated Continue to Be Available, Contrary to Viral Posts. https://www.factcheck.org/2022/04/scicheck-covid-19-data-comparing-vaccinated-vs-unvaccinated-continues-to-be-available-contrary-to-viral-posts/

Unvaccinated people are still dying from Covid-19. https://fullfact.org/health/unvaccinated-dying-covid/

COVID-19 Vaccines Reduce Hospitalization and Death Rates, Contrary to Social Media Claims. https://www.factcheck.org/2022/04/scicheck-covid-19-vaccines-reduce-hospitalization-and-death-rates-contrary-to-social-media-claims/

Texas Data Shows Unvaccinated People 20 times More Likely to Die From COVID-19. https://www.dshs.texas.gov/news-alerts/texas-data-shows-unvaccinated-people-20-times-more-likely-to-die-from-covid-19

Severe COVID-19, death lowest by far among vaccinated Canadians. https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/severe-covid-19-death-lowest-far-among-vaccinated-canadians

How to Create Anti-Vaccine Propaganda About…