To the Editor:
I was disappointed to see tonight that The Star Herald has republished and promoted a very inaccurate and harmful news article on Covid-19, originally published by Mississippi Today and authored by William Stribling. The article is titled "Vaccine Resistant Covid-19 Strain Detected in MS." The article has had a large number of online reads and was also republished on Facebook on The Star Herald page.
This is a very harmful article because the headline is totally inaccurate. Many seeing it may now think that current vaccines are totally ineffective against the Covid-19 strain recently detected in MS for the first time, although already known to be present in many other states. It is grossly inaccurate to say flatly that this strain is "Vaccine Resistant." This is not true at all. While it is fairly complex medically to explain, "resistance" is actually either a confusing or incorrect biological term to use when talking about the effectiveness of current vaccines against Covid-19. See for example: JAMA, [Journal of the American Medical Association] published online March 17, 2021, "COVID-19 Vaccines vs Variants—Determining How Much Immunity Is Enough." This article states, "Some scientists have used the term vaccine resistance to describe the reduced efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines against some variants. But that confuses matters by suggesting vaccines are analogous to antibiotics..." The author goes on to scientifically explain why this is misleading or inaccurate.
I have listened closely to the MS Department of Health press conference announcing the detection of this variant in MS, already known to be in a large number of other states. It is the South African variant, also known as B.1.351. The purpose of the press conference was not to announce with alarm that a totally VACCINE RESISTANT strain had now been detected in Mississippi. Unfortunately, Channel 12, WJTV, who was broadcasting the original press conference to the public screwed up big time on the audio transmission of the press conference. Because of this, after Dr. Dobbs made his first clear statement about announcing the detection of the new strain, the moderator had to ask him to please recap what he had said. This was partly because WJTV did not have audio at the opening of the press conference.
In his recap, which Dr. Dobbs did hastily, only on this one short occasion were the words "vaccine resistance" mentioned in passing. Prior to this, Dr. Dobbs had spoken only of vaccine efficacy, as in degrees of effectiveness. Also, actually all Dr. Dobbs said, which was the only mention in the entire press conference, was that the strain had shown "some resistance" to perhaps one vaccine. He then, however, went on to explain how and to what degrees the various vaccines were still effective, i.e. had vaccine efficacy, although degree of efficacy may vary by vaccine type. "Some resistance" is a long distance journalistically from declaring in a headline that the strain was "Vaccine Resistant" as MS Today did. It also has to be remembered that the types of vaccines available are radically different, some being mRNA vaccines, others more traditional vaccines. This headline condemns all vaccines.
The headline by MS Today amounts to fear mongering and is capable of producing stress and anxiety in readers, something no one needs presently. I think the Star Herald needs to produce a correction of some sort. The MS Today article has been criticized online in Twitter and elsewhere by me and others for its sensationalism and poor journalism. One viewer posted, "This is misleading. Dr. Fauci addressed the South Africa variant yesterday--never called it "vaccine resistant." ALL vaccines keep you alive, we have to stop with the hyperbolic clickbait headlines that do nothing but frighten and mislead." This is why I was so disappointed to see the Star Herald push this type of journalism, and why I think an editorial correction might be warranted.
My letter provides a link to the MSDH press conference. This link was posted after the press conference and has fine audio, but the original broadcast made available to the public by WJTV Channel 12 on Facebook had no sound throughout Dr. Dobbs initial statement. Just before about minute 37, Dr. Dobbs is asked to recap what he said in his first statement, because of the initial audio problem. In his initial statement he did not mention Vaccine Resistance at all. I think his brief mention of it here was picked up by the MS Today reporter, and he sensationally ran with it big time as a headline, although this was not actually emphasized in the press conference itself.
Below is a copy of the sensationalist headline published by MS Today and the large number of reads it has already accrued by the Star Herald republishing it. Also of note is that as of the time of the press conference there was ONE case in ONE county in MS.
VACCINE-RESISTANT COVID-19 STRAIN DETECTED IN MISSISSIPPI
Beverly Johnson
Kosciusko
