Verdict: Pants on Fire.
Explanation:
There was already a fact check that shows that COVID-19 vaccines have not caused a 1,000 per cent surge in excess deaths of children. The claim initially stated that in children aged 0-14 there has been a horrifying 542 per cent INCREASE in excess death this year compared with last year in Europe. Soon after, the claim was revised, showing the figure was meant be showing deaths of children have gone upwards to 1,101 per cent.
The original claim referred to "excess deaths", which are any deaths in addition to what would normally be expected given past trends, including those directly and indirectly related to COVID-19. However, this claim was even worse with specifying the 17x increase in child deaths came from the COVID vaccine.
Tim Adair, principal research fellow with Melbourne University's School of Population and Global Health, took issue with the blogger's "problematic" comparison of 2022 with 2021.
This was "because much of Europe spent large parts of the first half of 2021 in lockdown, a period when deaths in ages 0-14 years were lower than the baseline or expected level".
Dr Adair suggested that the post-lockdown resurgence of respiratory infections such as influenza and pneumonia could be playing a role in younger groups.
Meanwhile, Mr Jdanov said the increase might be explained by the "long-term consequences of the pandemic", such as overloaded public health systems, postponed treatments and screenings and the consequences of lockdowns.
Some of those same factors may also be pushing up infant mortality, he said.
Sources used:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-09-02/fact-check-excess-deaths-europe-not-vaccines/101394264
Where claim came from:
imgflip.com/i/7d1w1p
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