An arms race of irresponsibility

Earlier this week it appeared that the Mail had turned up the irresponsibility in reporting Natalie Morton's death up to 11 and that there was surely no way that anyone could skew the story more incorrectly in order to create panic. But wait. Back comes the Express today with what could be the most disgraceful front page of all time (or at least since the Scottish Sunday Express's Dunblane atrocity):



I'm guessing you probably have an incredulous look on your face, a bit like the opening-night audience watching Springtime For Hitler. But no. I saw this in the paper shop earlier: it's real all right.

Apart from the headline you'll see the sub-headline 'new doubts raised over death of teenager'. Bear that in mind when we look at the story, which is here (if you can stomach it). Is the HPV jab really as deadly as the cancer it's meant to protect? And who thinks that - a trusted source?

Dr Diane Harper, who was involved in the clinical trials of the controversial drug Cervarix, said the jab was being “over-marketed” and parents should be properly warned about the potential side effects.

But... is it as deadly as cervical cancer?

Authorities in the UK should be on the alert because its sister vaccine, Gardasil, used in America, has already been associated with 32 deaths, she said.

So another vaccine which isn't the one in the UK has been linked (but not proven to be the cause of) some deaths. I'm going to have to be terribly rude [/Paxman] but... is it as deadly as cervical cancer?

“Parents need to know this and that in a small number of cases there are serious side effects.”

But... is it as deadly as cervical cancer? Well, nothing this 'expert' has said implies that. Even if we assume the dissenting voice the Express has found is completely correct - and we'd be fucking mad to assume that - the headline still doesn't stack up.

Now to the fresh doubts over the teenager's death. Who do we think is behind these doubts - an expert? Someone who presided at the postmortem and disagrees with the conclusion? Or... just a tinfoil-hat fuckwit determined to bulldoze through their antivaxx bullshit even if it means creating baseless hysteria and being utterly disrespectful to the family of a young girl who has recently died?

Yes, I fear you guessed correctly.

Dr Richard Halvorsen, author of The Truth About Vaccines, said: “One minute Natalie is an apparently healthy girl, she has the vaccine and within two hours she is dead.
We are told she had a terrible cancer inside her that killed her but this is implausible.

What the fuck? Why implausible? What, they just made it up at the autopsy, did they? They slipped in a tumour with a bit of a conjuring trick?

“If you have cancer you have symptoms. Clearly public health doctors are desperate to turn the debate away from the vaccine as a possible cause.”

I'm not making it up. He really believes this shit, stopping short of saying that this poor girl's cancer is a smokescreen, that doctors faked the postmortem results, that there's a huge conspiracy all the way to the top of Government just to promote a vaccine. These are the kind of people the Express uses as trusted sources for its stories.

Bearing in mind the story's about the 'deadly' jab, this is the evidence that the Express has for that:

Jabs, the vaccine support group, has received details of 19 girls who have suffered serious health problems, including seizures, fatigue or joint and muscle pain, since their jabs.

Do you think muscle pain is the same as a seizure and should be bundled together to bulk out the numbers? I don't. And to call Jabs a 'vaccine support group' is a little on the generous side.

But why should anyone care? It's clearly an arms race now. The Mail and Express are trying to outdo each other with ever more irresponsible stories. It's appalling that they should come out with a cockeyed conspiracy theory as to the real cause of Natalie Morton's death, with no evidence whatsoever to back it up. And it's deplorable that they should claim that the jab is more deadly than the cancer it's meant to protect, when even their wheeled-in expert on the matter doesn't say it.

You have to conclude they couldn't give a shit. Who knows, maybe they've flogged a few more papers today on the back of this complete shower of shit. I hope they're really proud of themselves, if they have.

Hat-tip: Adam Bienkov.