Health & Lifestyle

Florida’s vaccine-skeptic surgeon general Joseph Ladapo warns everyone under 65 AGAINST getting new Covid booster vaccine

  • Dr Joseph Ladapo said Florida does not recommend new boosters for under-65s
  • His recommendation goes directly against new CDC guidance 
  • READ MORE: Florida Surgeon General warns NOT to take latest COVID booster

Florida‘s surgeon general said state health officials will warn everyone under 65 against getting the new Covid booster vaccine.

Dr Joseph Ladapo – who was accused of promoting faulty vaccine data last year – claimed today there is ‘a complete absence of figures’ about whether the updated vaccines work.

Dr Lapado – who was handpicked by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis – also promoted the false claim that there was ‘not a drop of clinical trial data’ supporting the vaccines. 

Speaking at a vaccine panel today, Dr Lapado said: ‘I just think that at this point, with the amount of immunity that’s in the community, virtually every walking human being has some degree of immunity.

‘And the questions we have about safety and about effectiveness, especially safety, my judgment is it’s not a good decision for young people and people who are not at high risk at this point in the pandemic.’

Florida Surgeon General Dr Joseph Ladapo said the state will not recommend people under 65 get the updated Covid boosters

Florida Surgeon General Dr Joseph Ladapo said the state will not recommend people under 65 get the updated Covid boosters

The above graph shows cardiac arrest fatalities among under-34s for every year since 2000. This is from the CDC Wonder database. Data for 2021 and 2022 is provisional

The above graph shows cardiac arrest fatalities among under-34s for every year since 2000. This is from the CDC Wonder database. Data for 2021 and 2022 is provisional

Dr Ladapo has repeatedly endorsed claims the vaccines are causing widespread heart problems in young people, a link has been repeatedly disproven by large studies.

Vaccines have been linked to a very small risk of myocarditis in young people, affecting about one in 30,000 under-40s after their second jab.

But cases are normally mild and resolve on their own without the need for any medical intervention.

A Covid infection is also more likely to trigger myocarditis than the vaccines, studies show.

And data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows cardiac deaths among Americans under the age of 34 are similar to pre-pandemic levels.

The updated Covid shots, approved just this week by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), have been deemed safe for everyone aged six months and older and have been recommended for everyone in that age range.

However, in a vaccine panel hosted by DeSantis, Florida’s Surgeon General Dr Joseph Ladapo said there is ‘a complete absence of data’ about whether the updated vaccines work. 

The top state health official was joined by several other doctors, who claimed approval of booster shots is ‘irresponsible’ and the FDA and CDC are ‘failing’ at their jobs.

Dr Ladapo’s most recent declaration comes days after he warned Americans not to take the updated vaccine over ‘red flags’ for its safety and amid mixed recommendations from health experts on who should and should not roll up their sleeves to get the newest booster. 

DeSantis echoed Dr Ladapo’s sentiments, writing in a press release sent after the panel: ‘I will not stand by and let the FDA and CDC use healthy Floridians as guinea pigs for new booster shots that have not been proven to be safe or effective.’

'I will not stand by and let the FDA and CDC use healthy Floridians as guinea pigs for new booster shots that have not been proven to be safe or effective,' Florida Gov Ron DeSantis wrote in a press release sent after the panel

‘I will not stand by and let the FDA and CDC use healthy Floridians as guinea pigs for new booster shots that have not been proven to be safe or effective,’ Florida Gov Ron DeSantis wrote in a press release sent after the panel

During the panel, Dr Ladapo slammed CDC director Dr Mandy Cohen for her Tuesday statement, which read: ‘Vaccination remains the best protection against Covid-19-related hospitalization and death.’

‘She has made this statement without a drop of clinical trial data about these products that were just approved that don’t say anything about their effectiveness or their safety in human beings,’ Dr Ladapo said. 

‘We are just at a point where we have the director of the CDC making very clear statements in the complete absence of data and somehow many people believing that is true.

‘It’s not something that ought to be ignored if the objective is to support the health of human beings.

‘It’s an enormous disservice to every American and, frankly, every human being walking on this planet who is concerned about becoming ill from Covid-19,’ Dr Ladapo continued.

Doctors joining DeSantis and Dr Ladapo expressed concern over the lack of research conducted on the new vaccines. Dr Tracy Beth Hoeg, an epidemiologist at the University of California San Francisco who participated in the panel, pointed toward a small study conducted on one of the boosters made by Moderna.

The study followed 50 participants and found one person, or two percent of the study’s population, experienced adverse effects directly related to the vaccine.

Dr Hoeg did not say what the adverse effect was. 

‘Right now, we’re sitting totally devoid of useful data. It puts us all in a very difficult position when it comes to whether or not to recommend of take these vaccines,’ Dr Hoeg said. 

‘Healthy people under the age of 65 have, from what we know, very little to gain from the vaccine. We don’t know what the benefits of the vaccine will be.’

Dr Jay Bhattacharya, a professor of health policy at Stanford University, told the panel: ‘There is no chance that a product like this would have gone to market with the kinds of data currently available.’ 

‘I think that it is an absolutely irresponsible move by the FDA to approve this product and the CDC to recommend that everyone take it.

‘It is absolutely essential for our regulatory agencies to require these drug companies to produce better data if they want approval. That’s their job, and they’re failing at it.’

The FDA approved new boosters from Moderna and Pfizer on Tuesday, and the CDC has urged every adult and child over the age of six months to take the new vaccine, which has been designed to target newer versions of the Omicron variant.

Health officials are hoping to top-up immunity levels nationwide ahead of the winter as Covid rates rise nationwide for the first time this year — though top experts expect it to be a mild wave of the virus. 

This is the second booster the CDC has recommended. Last year, the CDC also recommended the Covid bivalent booster for everyone aged six months and over.

But other countries only cleared it the previous booster for older age groups, with the UK giving it the green light for those aged 50 and over and Italy for those aged 60 and over.

There are signs, however, that health chiefs will struggle to get Americans to turn up for the new Covid booster vaccine this year, after uptake languished last year.

Overall, just 17 percent of eligible Americans came forward for the bivalent vaccine, which protected against versions of Omicron.

Among people older than 65 years old — who are most at risk of severe disease — nearly six in 10 failed to come forward to get the shot.

Some experts are already urging only older Americans to come forward to get the updated Covid booster, with Dr Paul Offit, who sits on the FDA’s vaccine advisory panel, telling DailyMail.com last week that adults under 75 years old who are healthy do not need to get the shot.

It comes as Covid metrics continue to rise in the US amid the emergence of new more transmissible variants.

Covid hospitalizations are up nearly nine percent in a week, reaching 18,871 admissions over the seven days to Sept 2.


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