Cervical cancer vaccine didn't kill U.K. teen
It turns out that the Cervarix cervical cancer vaccine was not responsible for the tragic death of 14-year-old Natalie Morton of Coventry who died earlier this week within two hours of receiving the shot.
An autopsy showed that the young woman died from a previously undiagnosed chest tumor. Doctors said it was an advanced malignant growth that was so far gone that it could have killed her at any moment.
Statistically, if you give a vaccine to enough people, a certain percentage will end up dying within hours, even if the vaccine doesn't kill anyone. Such deaths must be investigated, especially if they happen to young healthy people with no apparent risk of sudden death.
This case is a reminder of the risks of conflating correlation and causation in advance of the facts.
It's not even correlated. If one dies and a million don't, the correlation is with not-dying.
Posted by: dr2chase | October 02, 2009 at 07:36 AM
Notice all the British tabloids leading with screaming headlines retracting their previous shock stories about this. Not.
Posted by: chris y | October 02, 2009 at 07:55 AM
Certainly we shouldn't let anomalous outliers shape the overall analysis.
Does anyone allow for the possibility that we are being lied to about the autopsy results?
Posted by: twitter.com/billgiltner | October 02, 2009 at 10:19 AM
Yeah, I think the fallacy in play here is not equating correlation with causation but "post hoc ergo propter hoc". Pedantry!
Posted by: Anon | October 02, 2009 at 05:34 PM
Does anyone allow for the possibility that we are being lied to about the autopsy results?
Sure, but it doesn't change my actions in the least, so even if you had anything more than a suspicion, it's not terribly useful information. As noted above, the overwhelming correlation is with not-dying, and the vaccination has solid benefits.
Posted by: dr2chase | October 02, 2009 at 06:10 PM
Anon's right: Post hoc, ergo propter hoc.
It's logically possible that the autopsy report was falsified. On the other hand, I doubt the medical examiner's office in Coventry has any incentive to embark on a massive conspiracy. They don't work for GlaxoSmithKline and they don't set vaccination policy.
Posted by: Lindsay Beyerstein | October 02, 2009 at 10:40 PM
You're just trying to cover up the obvious conspiracy, Lindsay! GlaxoSmithKline is run by Obama's Kenyan cribmate who has an uncle in the Coventry medical examiner's office! Demand to see the birth certificate!
Posted by: michael schmidt | October 03, 2009 at 12:01 AM
I think the role of the vaccine is to save lives and not to kill,...Well, in my opinion I think there is a cause but not the vaccine.
Posted by: fioricet online | October 05, 2009 at 02:14 AM
very nice post !!!!
Posted by: cancer disease | October 18, 2009 at 12:18 PM