Dr. Berman on Breakthrough Cases
Claim: “There were [approximately] 10,000 “breakthrough” covid cases amongst the first 100,000,000 vaccinated individuals, a 90% reduction from the [contemporaneous] case rate amongst unvaxxed ppl"
This is part of a series to highlight the ineptitude and sheer illiteracy of the experts my community has relied upon for covid medical advice. I am only employing arguments that can be made from the data/studies and other information available at the time the claim was made.
Claim: “There were [approximately] 10,000 “breakthrough” covid cases amongst the first 100,000,000 vaccinated individuals, which equaled a 90% reduction from the [contemporaneous] case rate amongst unvaccinated individuals.”
Source: On the Covid Vaccinations, published 6/21/21
Background: This claim was made before the sheer numbers of vaccinated covid cases made maintaining this claim untenable for the establishment.
The Facts:
The 10,000 number comes from the CDC who admitted it is a ‘substantial undercount’.
The standards for a positive test were changed specifically for vaccinated people.
The CDC stopped counting breakthrough cases after they started piling up much faster than they expected, probably because they were afraid it would undermine the claims of “95%” efficacy.
Dr. Berman claimed that there had been a mere 10,000 covid cases among the vaccinated, 90% less than cases in unvaccinated people over the same time frame. The significance of this point is to highlight the wide chasm between one’s susceptibility to covid unvaccinated versus vaccinated. As we shall document, this claim cannot withstand even mild scrutiny.
Firstly, the CDC (in)famously changed the standards by which covid cases would be identified and curated from the (however comically absurd) prior standards by which covid cases were documented, limiting positive case reports to those confirmed by a PCR test ≤ 28 CT count, down from as high as 45 CT’s (!!!!) employed by various laboratories throughout the pandemic, which would eliminate going forward anywhere from 40-90% (depending on the time, place and laboratory) of positive lab results counted throughout the pandemic. Furthermore, the CDC itself admitted in its Breakthrough Infections Report pertaining to the specific data point cited by Dr. Berman that
“[sic] the number of reported COVID-19 vaccine breakthrough cases is likely a substantial undercount of all SARS-CoV-2 infections among fully vaccinated persons. The national surveillance system relies on passive and voluntary reporting, and data might not be complete or representative. Many persons with vaccine breakthrough infections, especially those who are asymptomatic or who experience mild illness, might not seek testing.”
When even under the new restrictive standard breakthrough cases quickly began accumulating at an unanticipated clip (remember that the CDC was aware the official # was only capturing a slight fraction of the actual cases), threatening to undermine the trial-‘confirmed’ claims of “95%/96%/97%/98%/99% efficacy” (depending on the media appearance or guidance document), the CDC simply eliminated positive case tracking altogether, deciding to only track covid cases that resulted in hospitalization amongst vaccinated individuals (officially) beginning May 1st. In other words, not only is this number utterly devoid of meaning regarding conveying a measure of covid case incidence amongst vaccinated individuals compared to the case incidence amongst the previously unvaccinated population throughout the pandemic, it is equally irrelevant concerning even a basic comparison of contemporaneous case rates between the vaccinated and unvaccinated populations, as they are subject to wildly differing standards in both positivity threshold and minimum characteristics for reportability.
The bluntest rebuttal of this misguided contention is that it is akin to the Soviet Geiger-counters employed at Chernobyl. These Geiger-counters having a maximum reading of 3.6 rads/hour, showed exactly that upon reactor #4 melting down, which was dutifully reported as fact, despite the actual radiation leakage of reactor #4 exceeding 20,000 rads/hour. Similarly, the CDC simply ceased tabulating breakthrough cases after they hit 10,000. To quote one of my favorite lines from the bench, “to state the proposition bluntly is to refute it decisively”.
It is understandable that practicing doctors do not have the time to adequately peruse numerous studies and extensive guidance documents from various bureaucratic-minded agencies. Just as true, however, is that Dr. Berman quoted as definitive a CDC statistic that the CDC admitted publicly in supplementary documentation is “a substantial undercount”. This profound inaccuracy underscores the wide discrepancy between the statements and knowledge base of even the most noble-minded doctors and reality (and also highlights the devious politically-minded chicanery employed by the CDC in releasing a topline number they knew to be false, understanding that a gullible and compliant medical community/media would acquiescently present it as established fact without inquiring about its provenance or precision).