The Claim:
An environmental lawyer and presidential candidate is taking to television to claim that 22,000 vaccines need to be administered to prevent one death from COVID, but the vaccinated have a 23% greater death rate from all causes than their unvaccinated peers.
The Facts:
Pharmaceutical companies released data from a randomized, placebo-controlled COVID vaccine trial showing that the vaccine was 97% effective at preventing severe disease for the six months it was studied.
As with any vaccine trial, all deaths during the study period, whether or not the death was caused by the vaccine, are included in the data as well. In this case, 14 people who received the placebo died, and 15 people who received the vaccine died. Two people who received a placebo died from COVID, and one person who was vaccinated died from COVID pneumonia. No one’s death was caused by the vaccine.
Studies show that communities with many people vaccinated against COVID had lower death rates during the pandemic than those communities with low vaccination rates. Furthermore, estimates suggest the COVID vaccines saved 20 million lives in their first year globally. If everyone in the U.S. who was eligible had received a COVID vaccine, over 300,000 lives would have been saved.
Our environmental lawyer candidate’s numbers sound quite official, but they are fabricated and dwarfed by the real toll of COVID and the potential of the vaccine against it.
Disclaimer: Science is always evolving and our understanding of these topics may have evolved too since this was originally posted. Be sure to check out our most recent posts and browse the latest Just the Facts Topics for the latest.
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