Vaccine Resistance Dominates Discussion Event
A discussion of Covid-19 vaccines and nasal sprays last week revealed abundant misunderstandings that appeared resistant to clarification. A vocal group of about 15 people, most of them opposed to the vaccines, attended this Tri-State Lookout event led by a physician and a nurse with differing views, at the First Presbyterian Church in Port Jervis.
One speaker was infectious disease specialist Doug Manion, of Milford. In the 1990’s, after seeing many of his AIDS patients die, he led clinical research resulting in a one pill drug to prevent HIV from developing into AIDS, and he has worked in pharmaceutical research since then. He was recently CEO of a company, Kleo Pharmaceuticals, that did research on a product for Covid-19 prevention and treatment. He then volunteered in nasal spray research and now works for Arena Pharmaceuticals, where gastro-intestinal and cardiological drugs are the focus.
Barbara Marszalek, of Port Jervis, is a psychiatric nurse practitioner at Catholic Charities in Middletown and Resource Recovery Center in Goshen. She also founded Kamelot Kare, a community therapy center in Port Jervis. She gave a presentation about using such strategies as supplements, meditation and deep breathing to bolster the immune system but criticized vaccine research.
“Vaccines have had over 600,000 adverse reactions,” she said, asserting a common misconception about vaccine data that has stoked many alarmist social media videos.
Manion explained that adverse events occurring after vaccination are not necessarily caused by vaccination, and medical investigations have found few that stem from vaccination. The events are reported to the Vaccination Adverse Events Reporting System by medical professionals and patients, and then patterns and causal relationships are evaluated. The 600,000 events were reported during seven months, Decembet through July, when 180 million vaccinations were given.
Manion supported Marszalek’s advice to “be proactive about your immune system,” but disagreed with some of the details.
She talked about an over-the-counter nasal spray she sells for $30 a bottle, Cofix Rx, a 1.25% solution in water of povid iodine, a disinfectant. She said that, in May, the Food and Drug Administration website indicated that the spray had been advanced toward approval for Covid-19 protection.
However, Cofix Rx has only over-the-counter approval and does not appear on the FDA.gov website. It lacks FDA approval for protection from Covid-19, although the label asserts that it provides eight hours of protection from the virus. A National Institutes of Health website identified the spray’s status this way: “Most OTC drugs are not reviewed and approved by FDA. However they may be marketed if they comply with applicable regulations and policies. FDA has not evaluated whether this product complies.” (https://dailymed.nlm.nih.gov/dailymed/drugInfo.cfm?setid=c24ccee0-33d1-1353-e053-2a95a90ae178)
Marszalek described the spray as an “extra barrier, like a mask and social distancing.”
Manion expressed doubt about the nasal spray’s protective value through eight hours.
“Cilia, which are nasal hair in the airways, flush out foreign matter, but the virus overcomes the cilia,” he said. “A research group is studying nasal sprays, but it’s not clear how long the spray can be effective. You might take it in addition to the vaccine on a plane. I hope further study is done.”
Manion also took many questions from the audience. One woman raved about the value of ivermectin in overcoming Covid-19 infections, but Manion said that had not been demonstrated.
Another woman said that mRNA vaccines leave “nano-particles in your body like the ones used in gloves and boots and nonstick pans. They give you a magnetic field.”
“MRNA is just RNA in fat,” Manion responded. “There’s nothing metallic in vaccines.”
Someone else waved a cellphone with a video of a man who had once been a Pfizer executive, claiming that mRNA vaccines are too new and little tested to be safe.
Manion pointed out that mRNA vaccines had been developed years earlier for the SARS-1 virus, and the video speaker had left Pfizer long before mRNA vaccines were developed there.
A man asked about political influences on the FDA.
“The head of the FDA is a political appointee who reports to a political appointee, but FDA scientists are not political,” Manion said.
Suspicions and claims abounded, and audience members had to be reminded not to interrupt each other. Earlier unhappy incidents with the medical system seemed to be the foundation of distrust for some. Anne Horsham said that her mind wasn’t changed about vaccinations by Manion’s explanations. She said she had stopped trusting the county health department when they supported closing the Bon Secours maternity ward.
Another woman, Karen, claimed that her son’s disability stemmed from a vaccine, though she gave no explanation. Later, she said that her family of seven had all had Covid-19 early in the year and been treated neglectfully and condescendingly at times, “like second class citizens,” in local hospitals. She was also distressed about the likelihood that her husband would soon lose his job at an assisted living residence because of his unwillingness to be vaccinated.
A nurse across the room, Catherine, said that Karen had called her “rude” for “telling people what to do.” Catherine was one of few pro-vaccine people in the room. She had worked in a nursing home where Covid-19 “spread like wildfire,” killing many patients. She was sickened by the virus for three weeks in 2020 and still has lingering symptoms, she said.
What had caused the outburst from Karen?
“I don't think I said anything about pushing vaccinations. I asked about FDA regulation of over-the-counter meds. I said that vaccines using live virus, like the flu vaccine, shed viral particles, but the mRNA vaccine does not use a live virus. And I said that if people did not trust numbers from the New York Times or the CDC, they could listen to Steve Neuhaus, the Orange County executive, who presents numbers of hospitalizations and deaths with data directly from the hospitals twice a week.”
She pointed out the shortage of nurses and nurses’ aides, with high burnout rate and low pay. That shortage would intensify with state vaccination requirements, as about a third of nurses in her facility refuse to be vaccinated. But having experienced the virus, Catherine says she will no longer give a ride to work to an aide who has refused vaccination, wanting to avoid being in a small enclosed space with her.
Marszalek and Horsham said they planned to go to Albany to protest the vaccine mandate for health workers.
“Many are ticked off that ‘my body, my choice’ is not being upheld and that the government has been pushing, bribing, giving incentives to take this vaccine and those that don’t want it are being fired and being refused medical treatment,” Marszalek messaged on Facebook. She said that three people had told her that doctors had refused to see them if they were unvaccinated.