Adventist Immunologist Shares COVID Vaccine Facts

Spectrum Website
#1

A reader of Spectrum, Dr. David Burt is an immunologist with more than 30 years research experience in universities and vaccine companies. He has led scientific teams involved in the development of vaccines against various infectious diseases, including influenza and SARS. He received his PhD in immunology from the University of Birmingham, UK, and a BSc in biological chemistry from Essex University, UK. Burt received the African Canadian Achievement Award in Science in 1997 and the Harry Jerome Award for Health Sciences in 2006 for his professional work and promotion of science in the community. Currently, Burt is President of D.S. Burt, R&D Consulting, offering independent consulting advice in biotechnology and vaccine research and development. Burt is a member of the city of Toronto’s Black Scientist Task Force on Vaccine Equity, whose mandate is to engage the communities most impacted by the pandemic around issues related to COVID-19 and vaccines. 

This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at http://spectrummagazine.org/node/11632
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#2

I wonder if Burt has interviewed Dr. Peter McCullough and Dr. Robert Malone. It is always best to check with various sources to gain knowledge and personal growth.

#3

Relying on Dr. Peter McCullough is what anti-vaxxers Lynne and Kenneth Happel did, as their social media history indicates. Lynne is now dead from COVID-19 and Kenneth is fighting for his life in a hospital bed. If he survives, how can he ever live with himself? Husbands are supposed to protect their wives, but he didn’t do that, and now he has to deal with overwhelming grief and guilt for the rest of his life. Kenneth Happel, 72, Las Vegas, Entrepreneur, anti-vaxx, hospitalized with COVID. (sorryantivaxxer.com).

Last I checked, Dr. McCullough has fleeced the unvaccinated of almost $350,000 on his evangelical go fund me site. Is he going to donate some money to Mr. Happel for funeral expenses and medical bills? No. Is Ron Kelly, pastor of the Village SDA Church and chief promoter of Dr. McCullough in our faith community, going to reach out to Mr. Happel and offer financial assistance? No. The body count at Kelly’s church continues to climb, by the way. It seems every one or two weeks another anti-vax member of his church dies from COVID-19.

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#4

I appreciate this presentation from Dr. David Burt. He gave a good quick summary of the risks of getting vaccinated, together with the risks of not getting vaccinated, which I think clearly show the benefit of getting vaccinated.

The first external comment wondered if Dr. Burt had interviewed Dr. Peter McCullough and Dr. Robert Malone, and suggested that might help with gaining knowledge and growth. A quick internet search for each of those names makes clear that each of them are now primarily known for spreading misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines. Seeking out misinformation will not help anyone.

If any readers are interested in learning more about COVID-19 vaccine effectiveness and safety, I would suggest looking at the MMWR articles on the CDC web site. The system will not let me include links, so I will suggest an internet search for the terms below to find this.
mmwr cdc covid vaccine effectiveness

For anyone wanting to do their own research, there is plenty of information out there, but I would encourage you to find reliable information instead of misinformation. While the Omicron variant is killing a smaller percentage of those who get it than Delta, it is much less likely to kill people who are vaccinated (particularly those who have had boosters).

By way of disclaimers, I am a physician and epidemiologist and have worked for CDC for over 20 years. I earned my M.D. and M.P.H. from L.L.U., as well as previously my B.S. in biochemistry (back when La Sierra was part of L.L.U.). I think that the COVID-19 vaccines are very beneficial, and I do not think these should have been politicized nor become as controversial to some people as they have (as Dr. Burt discussed in his presentation). For your own benefit as well as the benefit of those around you, including those who are immune suppressed and children too young for vaccination yet, I strongly encourage everyone to get vaccinated, and to get boosters when recommended.

David Berglund, MD, MPH

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#7

I listened to the whole presentation, and it is fairly reasonable, he has a grasp of the topic, and touched on the important issues. It is likely that half to 2/3s of deaths were with covid rather than of covid.

But on misinformation, the CDC has been posting it since the beginning of the pandemic.
Read this short article on masks: Were masks a waste of time? in Unheard.com by Geoff Shullenberger, Feb 7, 2022.

He shows that masks had been shown to be ineffective way before covid. Here is one quote:

A document published by the World Health Organization in 2019 framed the results of these studies (on the effectiveness of masks in viral illnesses) in no uncertain terms: “there was no evidence that face masks are effective in reducing transmission of laboratory-confirmed influenza”. It’s unsurprising, then, that when the CDC briefed reporters on the pandemic in February of 2020, masking was not even mentioned among the NPIs that might be deployed. The UK government, too, stated early in 2020 that there was no evidence to support masking.

After the CDC and other agencies revised their guidance in April 2020, Dr. Anthony Fauci, by then a staunch advocate of masks, claimed that he and other officials had discouraged the public from obtaining masks to ensure there were adequate supplies for health care workers. Ever since, promoters of masking have cited Fauci’s “noble lie” to account for the abrupt reversal of prior guidance. But as Miller notes, it was not just during the early months of the pandemic that officials said masks were ineffective. They had said so for years, and Fauci had advised against masks not just in public statements but in private emails in early 2020. (end quote)

If the CDC, for its own reasons, was not giving us the truth, who are we to trust? McCullough and Malone were not even the worst misinformation passers. The recent Hopkins study showing that lock-downs were ineffective is another evidence that we were fed wrong information by those in leadership positions.

The most difficult problem with this topic has been the moral outrage against those that did not agree with masking etc. Our churches were divided by this. Those favoring masks condemned the dissenters as utterly immoral. It was hard to take. I have been called here an “Enemy of Souls” because I have not gone along with the party line. Perhaps a bit less judging is in order.

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#8

Based on analysis you have recently begun referring to yourself as the “enemy of souls”. Saying that you have been called this when you yourself are the one doing so is odd to say the least.
Comments that you have made to bait, troll and demean members of the forum have resulted in your banishment from time to time in the past.
It does cause one to wonder what the source of inspiration is for such behavior.

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#9

No comments on the mistakes at the CDC? Even The Atlantic is abandoning them (The Case Against Masks at School - The Atlantic)

I believe you were the first to apply the moniker. I suppose my mentioning it is a bit of mocking because it is such a stark accusation, and my opinions on these matters are being vindicated.

#10

Based on analysis in no comment were you called the “enemy of souls”. Baiting people by misrepresentation of fact is inappropriate and dishonest in nature.

Thank you however as your reply further illustrates my point.

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#11

I wonder if Drs. McCullough and Malone have talked to Dr. Burt? If so and they listened, perhaps they would cease leading a death cult.

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#12

Hmmm… Here is your post #105 from the Spectrum thread: Who is being gaslighted?

“Your spreading medical misinformation and adding political spin on the pandemic does not make you a more pious Christian nor does it demonstrate your competence as a medical practitioner. It makes you both dangerous and an active agent of the enemy of souls who goes about misrepresenting God and destroys lives.”

I was mistaken. You just called me an agent of the enemy of souls…

But this discussion is useless.

How about real talk about masks and mandates etc.? And the utter uselessness of lockdowns?

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#13

This from the Las Vegas Review-Journal editorial Feb 8: More Governors Dump Mask Edicts, Where Is Sisolak?

But the CDC, which has issued so much confusing advice over the past two years that its officials may soon be banned from Spotify. (LOL…)

#14

Have you tried calling 911?

#15

Yet you stubbornly persist in the same level of thinking and double down on spreading misinformation. This does not make one a credible source of medical advice or a pious Christian.

The reader can judge by the fruits of what you advocate and your own words to whom the source of inspiration and service is dedicated to. It is a great sorrow that this is the case and one can only hope the Holy Spirit’s guiding will inspire people to turn from this.

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#16

David 1. Have you read the John Hopkins report on the uselessness of Lockdowns? Have you read any reports that show that masks were not effective? Death rates were the same in mandated states as non-mandated ones.

But instead of answering you revert to name calling! I ASK, WHAT IS THE MISINFORMATION THAT I AM SPREADING?

I am vaccinated. It works really well. I have even been boosted. But the masks do little to nothing,and lockdowns did not do anything either. Go ahead prove otherwise, rather than opinion. And Biden and Harris politicized the debate. Just how it was.

But unless you have some info to share, I am done. Best of luck. And may God bless you.

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#17

Sorry had to say one more thing.

There is an interesting article in Issues and Insights: Did any of the COVID mandates closures, lockdowns etc. do anything?

And apparently they did not. (really good article)

What should we have done? My opinion:

  1. Sequestered the vulnerable, elderly and those with comorbidities.
  2. Develop a vaccine as rapidly as possible. (Trump did that, but got little credit)
  3. Once a vaccine is available, vaccinate most vulnerable first and go down the list to least.
  4. All the rest of us should have just kept doing what we were doing. No mask mandates, quarantines, lockdowns, or testing. These did not help.

Most people, especially children were not going to be harmed. The rest of us had to take some risk, but 99.7 adults survived the disease. The interventions just made things worse.

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#18

I have. The article is what’s called a preprint, meaning that it hasn’t been peer-reviewed and hasn’t been published formally. It’s from a group of economists - not scientists, not medical personnel - and not endorsed by John Hopkins - one of them just happens to work there.

In the paper, 1/3 of the papers reviewed were themselves, preprints as well, and 1/3 were economic papers, not epidemiology or any associated health field. They ignored any study that involved the transmission of disease. I’ll repeat that, they ignored any study that looked at how the disease was transferred. Half the studies came from 2020, and therefore can only talk about the Alpha variants, and not about Delta or Omicron. Here is an actual study from 2020 which shows that lockdowns have an effect on the transmission of disease.

It’s a load of rubbish, and more worryingly, the counter-arguments against it are widely available and freely discussed, and yet it’s still being touted as ‘evidence’.

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#19

Really you have read it and seen the John Hopkins Emblem on it and the front page that says John Hopkins Institute for Applied Economics, Global Health, and the Study of Business Enterprise. file:///C:/Users/15097/OneDrive/Pictures/me/A-Literature-Review-and-Meta-Analysis-of-the-Effects-of-Lockdowns-on-COVID-19-Mortality.pdf
Abstract
This systematic review and meta-analysis are designed to determine whether there is empirical evidence to support the belief that “lockdowns” reduce COVID-19 mortality. Lockdowns are defined as the imposition of at least one compulsory, non-pharmaceutical intervention (NPI). NPIs are any government mandate that directly restrict peoples’ possibilities, such as policies that limit internal movement, close schools and businesses, and ban international travel. This study
employed a systematic search and screening procedure in which 18,590 studies are identified that could potentially address the belief posed. After three levels of screening, 34 studies ultimately qualified. Of those 34 eligible studies, 24 qualified for inclusion in the meta-analysis. They were separated into three groups: lockdown stringency index studies, shelter-in-placeorder (SIPO) studies, and specific NPI studies. An analysis of each of these three groups support
the conclusion that lockdowns have had little to no effect on COVID-19 mortality. More specifically, stringency index studies find that lockdowns in Europe and the United States only reduced COVID-19 mortality by 0.2% on average. SIPOs were also ineffective, only reducing COVID-19 mortality by 2.9% on average. Specific NPI studies also find no broad-based evidence of noticeable effects on COVID-19 mortality.
While this meta-analysis concludes that lockdowns have had little to no public health effects, they have imposed enormous economic and social costs where they have been adopted. In consequence, lockdown policies are ill-founded and should be rejected as a pandemic policy instrument.

Pretty sure you have not read it.

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#20

Pretty sure that the John Hopkins Institute for Applied Economics, Global Health, and the Study of Business Enterprise isn’t the John Hopkins School of Medicine. Otherwise it would have been published by, er, the School of Medicine, and not by the science and arts wing of the Krieger Institute.

You’ll also note the lead author (Advisor to the Centre of Political Studies Copenhagen, the second author, a professor emeritus at Lung University Sweden, and then finally we get to the third author at Hopkins.

I also note a complete lack of engagement with any of the points.

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Vaccines, Liberty and the Bible: A Sermon from Doug Hardt
#21

Who are they, and why should he listen to them? Are they epidemiologists, or some other kind of expert on pandemics and viruses? What qualifications/experience do they have that make them superior experts to Burt?

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#22

Search their names online. Try duckduckgo when searching.