An Open Letter to the Medical Profession

I'm trying to understand the medical case for vaccinating children against Covid-19 (when such an option becomes available). Will you help?

I’m writing today with a genuine question.  I’ve seen recent reports that Pfizer is almost ready to declare its Covid vaccination safe for children and apply to the FDA for Emergency Use Authorization (EUA).  We all know that the FDA will then face intense pressure to grant the EUA ASAP—and that as soon as it does, the pressure will shift to parents around the country.    

Now, I’m not a doctor.  I’ve got no training in health care or epidemiology or pharmacology or any other substantive field that might be relevant to questions about vaccination.  I do, however, have a solid background in test design, probability & statistics, data science, and risk & decision analysis.  And I do have a simple question:

What is the medical case for vaccinating a healthy (i.e., no known pre-existing conditions) child between the ages of 5 and 11?

Let me be clear about what I’m asking.  Given my background, it should come as no surprise that I see all medical interventions—medicinal, surgical, or otherwise—as decisions to substitute one risk profile for another. 

That is to say, I fully appreciate that everything you put into or do with your body imposes some risk.  Then again, inaction in the presence of both internal and environmental factors also contains risks. Sound medical decision making should rest upon the idea that all recommended interventions reduce overall risk.

So when I ask whether a specific procedure is medically advisable, what I mean is: How does it alter a patient’s risk profile—and why are the ex post risks preferable to the ex ante risks?

Now, back to specifics:

Let’s start with the short term, setting aside for the moment any potential long-term effects of either Covid infection or the vaccine.

In the short term:

• What risks does Covid-19 pose to an otherwise healthy 5-11 year-old?

• What risks does an unvaccinated 5-11 year-old impose upon others?

• Can you quantify those risks?

• Which of those risks would a vaccine reduce?

• What would those risks be (in quantitative terms) post-vaccination?

• What risks does the vaccine pose to an otherwise healthy 5-11 year old?

• Can you quantify those risks?

• How did you obtain your quantifications?

• Can you provide a source for your answers?

I understand, however, that many people have raised concerns about the potential long-term effects of both Covid-19 infection and vaccination.  So I have a similar set of questions there:

In the long term:

• What are the potential long-term effects of Covid-19?

• How long do these effects persist?

• What risk (in quantitative terms) do otherwise healthy 5-11 year-olds face of suffering from these long-term effects?

• How did you obtain your quantifications?

• How do we know that your list of risks is complete?

• What are the potential long-term effects of the vaccine?

• How long do these effects persist?

• What risk (in quantitative terms) do otherwise healthy 5-11 year-olds face of suffering from these long-term effects?

• How did you obtain your quantifications?

• How do we know that your list of risks is complete?

• Can you provide a source for your answers?

Finally, to bring it all together:

What makes you believe that the risk profile of a vaccinated 5-11 year-old is superior to the risk profile of an otherwise identical unvaccinated 5-11 year-old?

It seems to me that these should all be pretty basic questions.  I don’t see how any doctor bound by the Hippocratic Oath could recommend or administer any medical treatment—much less an experimental vaccine—without being able to answer them.

Please note that these are all very serious questions.  I’ve done a fair amount of digging, and I’ve been unable to find anyone who has even tried to answer them. 

I’ve found plenty of articles from prestigious sources that simply assume that vaccinating children would be desirable. 

I’ve found a sizable number of prestigious authors who have cautioned against vaccinating children. 

I’ve heard the political cases in both directions. 

But I’ve been unable to find anyone who has addressed what should be the most basic question: What will we gain by vaccinating our children?

Unless and until someone puts forward the medical case for child vaccination, questions of safety and authorization should be irrelevant.

If you are in, or if you know, anyone in the medical profession, please share this posting—and please urge them to share it throughout their own networks.

I look forward to receiving serious answers. If you’d like to anonymize them before sharing, that’s fine too. I fully appreciate the risk profile inherent in putting forward an informed professional opinion running counter to a politically desired narrative.

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For more information about Bruce D. Abramson & American Restorationism, visit: www.BruceDAbramson.com

To learn more about how America’s elites destroyed the republic, see:  The New Civil War: Exposing Elites, Fighting Utopian Leftism, and Restoring America (RealClear Publishing, 2021).

To learn more about the ideology driving today’s anti-American leftism, see: American Restoration: Winning America’s Second Civil War (Kindle, 2019).