The former president of the peak medical body, the Australian Medical Association, has come out to say that discussion around vaccine injuries is being “censored” despite data confirming COVID-19 vaccines can cause adverse reactions.
Dr. Kerryn Phelps says she recently suffered from a vaccine injury and that she faced “obstruction and resistance” to openly discuss the issue, according to a submission to the federal Parliament’s inquiry into Long COVID.
She said that while current COVID-19 vaccines may reduce the risk of developing Long COVID by an estimated 15 percent up to 41 percent, recent data shows the risk remains for most people after immunisation, with some adverse events going on to causing “long-term illness and disability.”
The doctor was a notable public figure over the course of the pandemic frequently providing public health advice.“Vaccine injury is a subject that few in the medical profession have wanted to talk about,” Phelps wrote.
“Regulators of the medical profession have censored public discussion about adverse events following immunisation, with threats to doctors not to make any public statements about anything that ‘might undermine the government’s vaccine rollout’ or risk suspension or loss of their registration.”
Phelps said there has been a “delay in recognition of vaccine injury,” partly due to under-reporting, concerns about vaccine hesitancy, and “needing to find the balance between risks and benefits on a population level.” Meanwhile, reactions were claimed to be “rare” without data to confirm how common or otherwise these reactions were.
Her comments come as medical professionals continue being cautioned on what can and cannot be said about the efficacy of vaccines.A guideline from the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency states: “Any promotion of anti-vaccination statements or health advice which contradicts the best available scientific evidence or seeks to actively undermine the national immunisation campaign (including via social media) is not supported by National Boards and may be in breach of the codes of conduct and subject to investigation and possible regulatory action.”
The 15 National Boards each oversee a medical profession including general practitioners, nurses, emergency workers, and dentists.Medical Research Will Suffer If We Are Slow to Accept the Facts
Meanwhile, the former AMA president said patients suffering vaccine injury have “had to search for answers, find GPs and specialists who are interested and able to help them, spend large amounts of money on medical investigations, isolate from friends and family, reduce work hours, lose work if they are required to attend in person and avoid social and cultural events.”
Within this group there is a “diminishing cohort of people who have symptoms following immunisation, many of which are similar to Long COVID (such as fatigue and brain fog), but who have not had a COVID infection,” Phelps added, noting that this is “possibly due to the effects of spike protein” from COVID vaccines.
The doctor said that if the discussion around vaccine injury continues to be smothered, there would be little progress in “developing protocols for diagnosis and treatment” and that this would lead to research projects or treatments progressing slowly.
The former MP of the New South Wales electorate of Wentworth acknowledged the science “is at an early stage” because “we are just over two years into the pandemic.”
“All of the studies that have been published so far are either small or case studies only.”
“The burden of proof seems to have been placed on the vaccine injured rather than the neutral scientific position of placing suspicion on the vaccine in the absence of any other cause and the temporal correlation with the administration of the vaccine.”
Phelps’ Experience With Vaccine Injury
Phelps revealed in her case, the vaccine injury resulted in dysautonomia with intermittent fevers and cardiovascular implications including breathlessness, inappropriate sinus tachycardia and blood pressure fluctuations.
“I have spoken with other doctors who have themselves experienced a serious and persistent adverse event including cardiological, rheumatological, autoimmune reactions and neurological consequences.”
She said while there is higher awareness about the unusual blood clotting from Astra Zeneca, “less generally recognised are the reported adverse reactions after mRNA vaccines by Pfizer and Moderna beyond myocarditis and pericarditis.”
Phelps said she had spoken with patients that had a “mistaken impression” that COVID vaccines would prevent them from getting COVID.“This over-reliance on vaccines has come from a misconception that ‘effective’ means ‘you will not get COVID,’ on a background of generations of experience with vaccines which have been able to practically eliminate or vastly reduce the incidence of most preventable childhood diseases like measles, rubella, pertussis, and chickenpox,” she wrote.
“This is not the case with current COVID vaccines.
“Most people have no idea that they can still become very sick with COVID, even if “up to date” with booster vaccines. Overall, studies demonstrate that vaccine effectiveness wanes over about four to six months after completing the two-dose primary schedule and subsequent booster doses.”
