With the arrival of the ‘sixth wave’, we are assured by the Prime Minister and the Minister of Health, that our life routine will no longer be broken, that we will ‘contain’ the corona. is that so?
First, the routine of our lives has never returned, as there are still movement and flight restrictions on the unvaccinated, even though it has long been clear that the vaccine status does not affect the degree of infection with the virus. Second, no one has yet promised that all the restrictions will not be repeated exactly later. It has not yet been said – ‘You will never deprive your children of the right to education due to the corona virus’. Even the statement ‘We will never return the green passport’ has not yet been heard, even though the green note was, from day one, medically incorrect and invalid.
Every sane person already understands that the corona is ‘here to stay’, even if its appearance is wavy. The statement of some of my colleagues that there is no need to look back is inconsistent with the medical culture on which we were educated, and is wrong.
Many more say – ‘Indeed, mistakes were made in the closure policy, but how could we know’. Well, it would have been possible to know if there had not been a conception in the world and in the country of conception, if it had not been for the frightened and anxious conduct, and especially – if the leaders of the Ministry of Health had allowed for a variety of opinions and open discourse.
Returning to the example of education – as early as August 2020 I translated the document of the European Center for Disease Control (ECDC), which reads –
“Existing data also show that the closure of kindergartens and educational settings is unlikely to be effective … Such closures are not likely to add further significant protection to child health.” And so the ‘year of the year 5731’ also ‘went’, that today we know that ‘went to God’ in vain. The passing of time only reveals the depth of conceptualization, the immense damage – educational, social, health, and mental – that has been inflicted on our children by closing schools and shaking their entire world.
For the past two and a half years, the tone has been set by ‘experts’ (some of whom did not come from relevant content worlds at all) who have an almost unified worldview, who have held the raw information and exposed it selectively. After in November 2020 my colleagues and I appeared in Orly and Guy’s film – ‘Maybe the Rabbi of the World is Wrong’ – we were almost denounced by the medical and scientific community. I am sure that if this film had been released in June 2022 – it would have been at the heart of the consensus, since the message from it – that closure is a grave mistake that far outweighs its potential benefit – is today the new ‘bon-ton’.
What, then, should be done from now on?
First, stop using intimidation and coercion (direct or indirect). Such techniques are not only illegitimate – but the public is fed up with them and is no longer willing to cooperate with them.
Second – a professional and respectful dialogue between colleagues should be allowed, even if they have different opinions. The improper use of collective labeling (such as ‘vaccine-resistance’) as a means of belittling and grinning – must stop.
Third, the scientific community must be allowed access to the full raw information, and it must be analyzed using the principles of scientific research. Significant clinical outcomes such as ‘death from any cause’ or long-term side effects (and not just immediate ones) should be presented, and clinically insignificant outcomes such as antibody rise or prevention of asymptomatic infection should be discontinued and echoed. And there is no choice – one has to admit mistakes that have happened along the way. Without it – public trust will not be restored. Thus for example – despite the vaccines and booster doses and even though Omicron was less violent, the beginning of 2022 was characterized by a huge increase in mortality, which was never before seen. We must, immediately, understand what are the causes of death, the ages and characteristics of the ‘Winter Died 2022’. Decisions must not be continued without this data analysis.
When the storm is forgotten, the scientific community will have to do a home inspection to understand how it has given up basic principles of informed consent, due diligence, objectivity, controlled research and agenda-free publication in the professional press. The medical community will have to acknowledge this and apologize for grossly and coercively entering the intimate space between doctor and patient and for instilling fear in its people. And of course – the interaction between the pharmaceutical industry and medicine will have to undergo a fundamental change from the establishment to the Tefahot.
My friends and I continue to analyze and study the corona plague not in order to ‘be right’, but because the mission, in many ways, has not started at all, since the virus is only a small part of this story, and certainly not the most important part. The most important part is, always, human beings and their actions. Wrong processes that have happened here could happen again in other contexts, even broader, if we do not stop, learn and draw conclusions, honestly and courageously.
Dr. Raya Leibowitz is the director of the Oncology Institute, Shamir, a senior faculty member at Tel Aviv University, and a member of the “It is also possible otherwise” group of physicians who offers a different way of dealing with the corona crisis.
The things in the article are her personal opinion and not the opinion of the medical institution where she is employed