After the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) was expected to release a study showing that COVID-19 vaccines reduce the risk of severe illness, NBC News reports that acting director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya pushed the pause button, citing concerns about the methodology.
“Dr. Bhattacharya wants to make sure that the paper uses the most appropriate methodology for such a study.”
In what Bhattacharya labeled an “observational method,” the study uses a test-negative design that examines individuals who are sick enough to seek care, be tested and then give consent, with their vaccination rates compared to those who test positive versus those who do not.
Bhattacharya was appointed to run the CDC back in February until President Donald Trump nominates a permanent director. Leading health officials in the Trump administration have criticized how vaccine research is typically conducted, questioning methods that have long been used and are widely accepted among scientists.
Many public health experts, like Dr. Fiona Havers, a former medical epidemiologist who resigned from the CDC in protest after HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fired the agency’s vaccine advisory committee and appointed a new group, see the delay as part of a broader effort to push narratives of doubt in vaccine safety and make them less available to those who need them. “I’m not saying that they haven’t stopped other publications or forced changes to them, but to wholesale stop this report from coming out, given that it is such a well-established platform and such a well-established methodology, does strike me as a new level of political interference into CDC’s scientific process,” Havers said.
However, Nixon insists the delay is simply because “Dr. Bhattacharya wants to make sure that the paper uses the most appropriate methodology for such a study” and the CDC “taking time to ensure analyses are methodologically sound and clearly communicated is always preferable to risking error.”
RELATED CONTENT: Daymond John Sues Former COVID Mask Business Partners Over Alleged Millions In Unpaid Profits
Source: Black Enterprise
