Stop Saying Stupid Shit
The COVID, Kids, Vaccine & Tennessee Edition
As per usual, there has been no shortage of stupid shit getting said lately. Tennesseans can owe thanks for this most recent volley of stupid shit to our Department of Health firing their director of vaccine-preventable diseases and immunization programs, at least in part, due to a memo mentioning the Mature Minor Doctrine and suggesting 12–15 year olds could be vaccinated against COVID-19 without parental permission. Twitter geniuses and media types are now convinced Tennessee Republicans are trying to end all childhood vaccination programs in order to nominate Polio as the Official State Symbol of Infectious Disease.
The TDH has already made their stance clear in an official statement:
“There has been no disruption to the childhood immunization program or access to the COVID-19 vaccine while the department has evaluated annual marketing efforts intended for parents,” Tennessee Department of Health commissioner Lisa Piercey, MD, MBA, FAAP.
This, of course, won’t stop random “experts” from saying stupid headline-grabbing shit like “these kids will die”.
Nevermind that for a decade Tennessee has ranked in the top 10 for MMR vaccines among kindergarteners, along with over 90% vaccinated for DTaP, polio, chicken pox, MMR and Hepatitis B.
Nevermind that these same experts aren’t sounding the alarm about 23 million kids missing routine vaccinations thanks to our COVID response.
Nevermind that Tennessee infant vaccinations were down 70% month to month in 2020 versus 2019 thanks to “safer at home” orders and school closures.
Nevermind that 5.82 billion of the world’s population remain unvaccinated for COVID-19, with only 1% of people in low income countries receiving a dose. You can vaccinate all of Tennessee tomorrow and we’d still have 5.82 billion people left that are enduring a global endemic virus, generating whatever the next variant is that we’ll all be terrified of. Instead of bickering over vaccinating incredibly low risk 12 year olds, we should be fighting for global vaccine equity to protect the most at risk worldwide, now.
Nevermind that according to the CDC’s Immunization Schedule the overwhelming majority of vaccinations occur in the first 18 months of birth. I think we can all agree that Tennessee drivers are bad enough that we’re not quite ready to let 6 year olds drive themselves to the local clinic for their second round of measles shots. And please let me know when the CDC updates their communication portal to include outreach to children instead of it being entirely parent and physician centric.
Among the ages where the Mature Minor Doctrine would come into play, these vaccines are already required by the state of Tennessee for a child to enter the 7th grade or to attend college in the state. The exception being the COVID vaccine, which if we’re being honest, is ultimately what all of this shit is about.
In an article gunning for the Saying Stupid Shit of the Week Award, we have an opinion piece in the Nashville Scene titled “Tennessee Republicans Would Rather Their Kids Risk Death Than Defy Them”, in which we’re told:
“We still don’t know what the long-term effects of COVID are”
What studies we do have show symptoms of long COVID are no more likely in children that have had COVID than those who haven’t. I’m willing to concede we do not know any longer term effects than what time has passed so far, as long as the author is also willing to concede that we know no more of the long term effects of the COVID-19 vaccine in children, which has only been emergency authorized for use in ages 12 through 15 since May 2021.
“Getting the vaccine is much safer than getting COVID when you’re unvaccinated”
It’s true that the data we have from vaccine studies show they are overwhelmingly safe, but saying they are safer than getting COVID in 12–17 year olds is, in fact, false. CDC estimates show that, among a million adolescents, around 3,000 12-17 year olds will visit the ER from adverse vaccine reaction versus only 200 12-17 year olds that would be hospitalized with COVID. And that 200 hospitalized by COVID number is using data that, based on two peer reviewed studies, was inflating hospitalization numbers by 40%, or more, for minors.
This isn’t misinformation or conspiracy theory. These are CDC estimates from observed data. Observed data from Israel suggests anywhere between 1 in 3,000 or 1 in 6,000 chances of myocarditis among 16–24 year old males after the vaccine, an incidence rate between 5 and 25 times the normal rate.
Was the adolescent outreach from the Tennessee Department of Health and their immunization partners for the COVID vaccines properly advising children (or parents) of these risks? Or was it just a smiling child with a band-aid on their arm?
Using data and reasonable decision making, countries like Germany and the UK are not doing mass vaccination of teenagers until more safety data is available, instead opting only to vaccinate teenagers who are high risk, immunocompromised or living with someone who is.
“if 12,600 people dead isn’t bad enough, it’s hard to know what would be”
As of July 15th, 2021 (Daily Age Group Outcome Dataset), the state of Tennessee has seen 12,633 total deaths with 5 deaths in the 0–10 age group and 5 deaths in the 11–20 age group, meaning 0.08% of all COVID deaths have occured in those 20 and under.
I’d expect anyone to safely be in the ‘one death is too many’ camp here, but according to the CDC Wonder Database in an average year from 2010–2019, Tennessee would see 32.5 respiratory disease deaths per year in the ages 0–19 vs. the 10 we’ve seen from 0–20 from COVID in 16+ months.
In 2019, Tennessee reported 18 deaths from respiratory distress of newborns under the age of 1 alone. Right now, Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt alone is seeing 10–20 kids hospitalized with unseasonal Respiratory Syncytial Virus, likely due to last years Safer at Home orders and school closures preventing typical exposure. If these were delta variant cases, there’d be panic in the streets. Kids suffering from anything else though? Turn a blind eye.
“We’re sending kids who can’t yet get vaccinated back to school.”
To even tease the school closure card due to COVID vaccine availability, with everything we know about the damages done in the last year, is peak-Saying Stupid Shit.
The majority of Tennessee schools, outside of extended closures in Nashville and Memphis, operated throughout the pandemic. Private schools managed throughout the pandemic. Most schools did it without required masking. Metro Nashville has announced masking will be encouraged, but not required for the upcoming school year. The data is clear, schools are not dangerous. School closures are dangerous though.
Stop listening to these people saying stupid shit who continue to use kids as pawns in their political antics and read this instead: “The kids are safe. They always have been.”
“And when it finally gets bad enough … all these people are going to flip-flop over and claim they advocated for vaccines from the start and that it’s not their fault you got sick and died. They will probably claim it was probably some Democratic conspiracy to kill off Republican voters.”
Finally, we get to the the part where it’s really just all about politicizing everything. I definitely can’t recall any vaccine flip-flopping being done by Democrats.
“They prefer their [Republican] constituents’ deaths over the unpleasantness of trying to convince them of the importance of getting vaccinated.”
It may surprise some to learn that the top 3 most fully vaccinated counties for COVID-19 in Tennessee as of July 16th, 2021 are Williamson County (48.76%), Meigs County (48.63%) and Loudon County (48.37%) who all voted Trump in 2020 (62.2%, 80.7% and 74%).
The “rural white Republican” blame game might also need a little help explaining Shelby County, sitting at 25th in the state in vaccinations, below the state average, with only 35.2% of their population vaccinated while being second lowest in the state in voting for Trump at 34%.
Using vaccination demographic numbers (Covid Vaccine County Demographics) from July 16th, 2021, only 28.1% of African Americans in Shelby County and 29.2% of African Americans in Davidson County have been vaccinated. KFF Polling Data from June 2021 shows blacks and hispanics are several times more likely than whites to answer “worried about missing work”, “not sure how or where to get the vaccine” and “worried they will have to pay” in why they haven’t gotten the vaccine.
We are actively failing these demographics with our messaging and, coupled with some terrifying history, are putting more of their lives at risk. I imagine Ta-Nehisi Coates would have no problem agreeing with that.
If disingenuity is going to be the crux of the discourse, what’s the point? It makes one wonder if these People Saying Stupid Shit are really just here to score a few political zingers while suckling any validation possible from their echo chambers… even when those echo chambers are made up of the same people who had no problem pushing the brunt of the virus on these same demographics while they Zoom Happy Hour’d at home for a year.
