Moderna was more deadly than Pfizer
Analysis of Czech data
Steve Kirsch has found a critical finding in the record level data from Czechia.
First, let’s just toy with an idea.
If a widely given drug caused death in 1 in 1000 what would the impact be?
For young people the impact would be astounding. There would be a huge number of extra deaths and a stunning number of total deaths compared to those who did not take the drug. For 100,000 people aged 20-29 there would be only 55 background deaths and 100 extra deaths. Comparing two similar sized populations the group with the drug would have 155 deaths compared to the expected 55 deaths. The mortality rate would be 155/100000 in the drug group and 55/1000000 in the non-drug group. The ratio between the two works out at 155/55 = 2.81.
For old people the impact would be much more subtle. For example, around 2% of people aged 80-89 will die in a year. For 100,000 people there would be 2,000 background deaths and only 100 extra deaths. Comparing two similar sized populations the overall ratio of the moratlity rate in the drug group compared to control would be 2100/2000 = 1.05.
Ultimately any signal would be much clearer in the young.
The Czech government have released record level data for 10 million people. The clever analysis Steve has done is based on the assumption that Pfizer was harmless. It can then act as a placebo group. It is an excellent placebo group because confounders around health and socioeconomic variables are accounted for because the brands were distributed randomly. All that is needed it to compare the overall mortality rate in the Moderna group with the Pfizer group. Barely any Moderna was given in January and the sick were being prioritised still in February so the graph below shows only March onwards. At all ages there were more deaths in the Moderna group. The impact on the young was higher. The dilution with higher background deaths in the old is clear.
.
Figure 1: Ratio of Moderna group’s mortality rate to Pfizer’s for those injected in March -December 2021 by age
Unless someone can provide compelling evidence of Moderna having been given to those more likely to die in every age group and throughout the time period then this is compelling evidence that it was more deadly.
It is not just a difference in efficacy. If it had been there would have been periods when the effect should have disappeared entirely e.g. June - October 2021 when covid deaths were at a low.
Figure 2: Ratio of Moderna group’s mortality rate to Pfizer’s for those injected during low covid death period July-October 2021 by age
For completeness here is the same graph for and January -June when covid rates were high
.Figure 3: Ratio of Moderna group’s mortality rate to Pfizer’s for those injected during high covid death period January-June 2021 by age
A significant number of Czech citizens also had AstraZeneca and their mortality was similar to Moderna’s.
There is more that can be learnt from this data but this is the first big finding that needs addressing.