Note word ‘likely’ by health officials

DEAR EDITOR:

So the provincial government and our Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry have decided that B.C. should be in the medical experimentation business — on a large scale basis yet! I’m pretty sure I don’t want to be part of that.

The manufacturers of the two vaccines currently in use recommend three and four weeks between first and second doses. B.C. originally decided on scanty evidence that the interval could be extended to five or even six weeks.

B.C.’s physician community was skeptical but a study by a research group at Royal Columbian Hospital concluded that “Extending the vaccine schedule is likely warranted.”

They also concluded that “it is likely that increasing the interval between the first and second doses of COVID-19 mRNA vaccines by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna is safe.”

Note the use of the word “likely” in both instances and remember they were talking about the interval being extended to six weeks, not the 16 weeks now proposed by B.C. officials.

Using the word “likely” is not the same as saying “the evidence clearly shows…”

I was under the impression that after listening to former President Donald Trump berate science and spout all sorts of nonsense, that we in Canada were going to do it “by the science.”

Well the vaccine has only been in widespread use for a maximum of 12 weeks so nobody has really done a definitive study on what happens if the interval is extended to beyond that.

Just this week, Dr. Anthony Fauci in the U.S. warned of the dangers of greatly extending the interval between doses and Canada’s chief medical scientist stated this week that B.C.’s plan was experimentation.

Don’t misunderstand me, I’m not an antivaxxer; I have had a flu shot every year for at least the past 27 years. And I’ve had every vaccination that a prudent person would expect to have.

But, unilaterally deciding to ignore the manufacturers’ guidelines doesn’t strike me as the best plan. I mean, if we really want to experiment (and I know Canada is really short of vaccine) why don’t we try just giving everyone half of the dose. That way we could vaccinate the entire province by April or May.

(B.C. government — please note that the line about half doses was a joke.)

Robert Handfield, Kaleden