Covid in Norway: 'Vaccine Evasion' Shows Vaxxed Require Hospitalisation and End Up in the ICU 11-13X Compared to 'Unvaccinated'

There were also 7X more deaths among the former, and while Omicron is receding, the IPH still peddles 'vaccines protect' BS while calling for 'strengthened surveillance' to be prepared

It’s been a little over two weeks since I last wrote about this topic, so: shall we take a look at what has been happening up north during these past few days?

In these posts, I explained that the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (IPH) admitted to a large and growing number of hospitalisations, ICU admissions, and Covid-associated deaths that were occurring esp. among the ‘boosted’.

Flying Blind, Norwegian Style

There were also two major changes in reporting on Covid cases: since week 10, the public health authorities don’t track ‘incidental’ positive tests anymore (I still believe they do, but they aren’t sharing these data anymore). Result: it’s impossible now to use the numbers for anything but bean-counting as the differentiation between hospitalisation and ICU admissions because of vs. with Covid-19 was gone.

Why? My ‘hunch’ is that the last available numbers (week 11, mid-March 2022) indicated that, at the height of the Omicron wave, the relationship between hospitalisation and ICU admissions ‘because of’ vs. ‘with’ Covid-19 was 1 : 13. Yep, you read that right: for every admission ‘because of’ Covid-19, there were 13 ‘with’ Covid-19.

At the same time, and without providing any explanation, the Health Directorate’s cool tool that allowed the public to track and compare these two figures, was discontinued on 22 March, i.e., even before most other countries started to change their testing policies on 1 April. (You may read up on this in my last update on weekly reports, dated 4 April; on the day thereafter, I also went through the most recent ‘overall threat assessment’, courtesy of the IPH.)

By now, Norway is running 0.31 daily tests per thousand people, according to OWID. In other words, they’re flying blind, with the ‘only’ publicly available data on all matters Covid-19 being the one discussed in the following.

Key Data Points From Week 15

The first post-Easter weekly update was trotted out without fanfare—and I shall provide a very brief account of the update for week 15 (11-17 April 2022) and spend more time on trying to contextualise these data.

The Omicron (BA.2) wave as definitely crested and is receding. There were only 131 new admissions for Covid-19 as main cause, a considerable decrease since 210 (week 14) and 248 (week 13). The incidence was highest in the age cohort of 75-84yo but note that ‘the easter break may have caused some delays in reporting’ (p. 3).

As regards Covid-associated deaths, the tally now stands at 2,871, with the peak of these deaths occurring in week 11. By now, about 2/3 of all Covid-associated deaths ‘occur in hospitals and care homes’ (p. 3).

Injection uptake continues to flatline. Like in late March, the share of the total population who received two doses remains at 73% (88% of 16+ and 89% of 18+); 83% of 16-17yo and 55% of 12-15yo received one injection; 43% of 16-17yo received two injections. These numbers are essentially the same as of 27 March, with the minimal increase of 1% update in the 12-15yo bracket being the only change.

Same with ‘boosters’—no changes: 53% of the entire population received a third injection; the share is 90% among 65+, 82% for 45+, and 66% for 18+. Among vulnerable groups, 81% of all 18-64yo in high-risk groups received a ‘booster’, as opposed to 74% (here there’s also a 1% increase) in moderate risk groups.

Omicron BA.2 surpassed BA.1 in week 6 (mid-February) and now constitutes around 98% of all sequenced tissue samples from the past two weeks. No significant changes to the virus were observed in the past two weeks.

Assessment by the IPH (p. 4, my emphases)

High vaccination coverage contributes to protection against severe Covid-19. The Omicron variant has also lower inherent virulence. The risk of serious illness is therefore very low for most infected people. Severe Covid-19 now particularly affects unvaccinated people and vaccinated people with old age or underlying diseases. It is still important that unvaccinated people start their vaccination, and that people over the age of 45 and medical risk groups over the age of 18 take a booster dose.

I’ve highlighted a few parts that we shall take a look at in the following. Before we do so, there’s more to the report than meets the eye, specifically this:

The Covid-19 pandemic is still ongoing. Although the epidemic in Norway is currently receding quickly, there is a need for strengthened surveillance, good plans and increased preparedness to meet any changes in the situation. There is still a risk of new waves of Covid-19 with Omicron-like variants or with completely new and more virulent variants that may also escape today’s vaccines.

Hospitalisation and Death Numbers Don’t’ Lie

Today, I shall only show two tables from the current report, because I think they tell you everything you need to know. First up, table 6 (p. 11), and I would like to draw your attention to the highlighted two columns from the ‘last 4 weeks’ (siste 4 ukene)—i.e., the peak of the Omicron wave—which provide the numbers for hospitalisations (sykehusinleggelser), ICU admission (intensivavdeling), and mechanical ventilation (ventilasjonsstøtte):

Total no. of hospitalisations: 923, of which 11% affected ‘the unvaccinated’, 11.5% occurred among ‘fully vaccinated’ (two dose recipients), and 77.5% affected ‘boosted’ individuals.

Sidenote: hospitalisation data indicates that we’ve moved past what I dubbed ‘alignment’, i.e., a correlation, however temporary, between injection uptake and hospitalisations (see here). Turns out that I’ve been wrong—such ‘alignment’ is a thing of the past, with the combined share of two- and three-dose recipients among admissions exceeding overall injection uptake (73% and 53% for ‘boosters’).

The numbers for ‘severe Covid-19’ are even worse for ‘the vaxxed’ than the overall admission data. In the past four weeks, there were 3 ‘unvaccinated’ patients in the ICU with Covid-19 as main cause—while there were 32 ‘boosted’ patients, a ratio of almost 1 : 11. With no data provided on two-dose recipients, who knows how badly they fare.

The numbers are yet worse for the ‘vaxxed’: in the past four weeks, only 2 ‘unvaccinated’ patients required mechanical ventilation—while there were 25 ‘boosted’ who did, a ratio of 1 : 12.5.

These trends are expressed visually in Fig. 4 (p. 12):

As regards the illustration, please take one more look at the above Table 6—which doesn’t provide any data on two-dose recipients in the ICU and/or requiring mechanical ventilation (**, i.e., due to privacy concerns, no data is given), even though there was a marked uptick in hospitalisations among precisely this segment of the population.

I don’t know what the people over at the IPH are smoking, but the above assessment (p. 3) reads like fiction:

Severe Covid-19 now particularly affects unvaccinated people and vaccinated people with old age or underlying diseases. It is still important that unvaccinated people start their vaccination, and that people over the age of 45 and medical risk groups over the age of 18 take a booster dose.

Look, I’m not a medical doctor, and so far, I’ve been reluctant to offer (unsolicited) advice. Yet, when I see these (unadjusted) ratios, one thing is clear to me: the IPH is lying through their teeth with the first sentence, and actively endangering everyone’s health with the second sentence. I think that the data, whatever it is worth, is crystal clear on the risk deriving from Omicron (BA.2) vs. the risks associated with these injectable products. Don’t take them, if you haven’t taken them so far.

EDIT (due to Brahms’ comment): I deem the above-referenced statement by the IPH really problematic because it’s only ‘partially’ true. In the same weekly report (pp. 9-10), there is additional data on the age brackets, which I shall reproduce below:

Translation: ‘number of new patients admitted to the hospital with Covid-19 as main cause [extrapolated to incidence] per 100,000 inhabitants, shown per week and age bracket, 24 Jan.-17 April 2022.

If you prefer this in tabular form, here goes:

Note specifically the really low numbers (less than 50 per week for the past four weeks) for people under age 55; note also that these numbers ‘explode’ once you look at senior citizens (aged 65+).

Now, the above two figures are from the most recent weekly report; to properly address your question, we now need to factor in injection uptake, which we can do (kind of) by looking at the most recent ‘Risk Assessment’ (linked above, dated 5 April 2022), specifically Table 18:

Translation: ‘number and share of vaccinated individuals, broken down by age brackets, 2 Dec. 2020-27 March 2022)’. Do note that injection rates—of 94-97% (two doses) and 82-91% (booster jabs)—among the above-referenced cohorts of those aged 55+ are highly correlated with their hospitalisation incidence.

Last Words: Covid-associated Deaths

The below Table 8 is on p. 17. Again, note the last four weeks, which show that only 14% of all Covid-associated deaths occurred among ‘the unvaccinated’, which is a slightly better death ratio of 1 : 7 and compares favourably to…your odds of hospitalisation, if you took any number of these injections.

Finally, A Word of Warning from the IPH

From the assessment (p. 4, my emphasis):

Although the epidemic in Norway is currently receding quickly, there is a need for strengthened surveillance, good plans and increased preparedness to meet any changes in the situation. There is still a risk of new waves of Covid-19 with Omicron-like variants or with completely new and more virulent variants that may also escape today’s vaccines.

You may read that as you like, but here are my two cents: if the Omicron wave is receding and it was so much more ‘mild’ than earlier variants, why do we need ‘strengthened surveillance’?

I agree that there may be ‘new waves of Covid-19’, but I’d wager it’s perhaps of overarching concern whether these may or may not be ‘Omicron-like’ or ‘more virulent variants’, as the IPH holds. If I were ‘vaccinated’, I’d be particularly wary of the last relative clause, which reads ‘that may also escape today’s vaccines’.

If this stunning idiocy weren’t so tragic—look again at Table 6, above—I’d laugh out loud. As it happens, reality shows that Omicron already ‘escape[d] today’s vaccines’.

If the past four months were ‘the good old times’ for ‘the vaccinated’, I don’t think I’d like to see what bad times imply. I fear, though, that we will find out before too long anyways.